
CROWN THEOLOGICAL LIBRARY 



-/J 



VOL. V. 
HARNACK'S WHAT IS CHRISTIANITY? 



WORKS BY PROFESSOR HARNACK 

HISTORY OF DOGMA. Translated from the Third German 
Edition. 7 vols. Demy 8vo. [Theological Translation Library.] 
Per volume, 10s. 6d. 

MONASTICISM, ITS IDEALS AND HISTORY; and THE 
CONFESSIONS OF ST. AUGUSTINE. Two Lectures, 
Translated. Crown 8vo. 4^. 6d. 

In Preparation^ a Translation of the author's latest work : 
DIE MISSION UND AUSBREITUNG DES CHRISTEN- 
TUMS [for the Theological Translation Library]. 



WORKS BY THOMAS BAILEY SAUNDERS 

PROFESSOR HARNACK AND HIS OXFORD CRITICS. 

THE QUEST OF FAITH: Being Notes on the Current 
Philosophy of Religion. 

THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF JAMES MACPHERSON. 

THE MAXIMS AND REFLECTIONS OF GOETHE, with 
Aphorisms on Science selected by Professor Huxley, and on 
Art by Lord Leighton. 

THE ESSAYS OF SCHOPENHAUER, 

1. The Wisdom of Life. 

2. Counsels and Maxims. 

3. Religion, a Dialogue ; and other Essays, 

4. The Art of Literature. 

5. Studies in Pessimism. 

6. Controversy. 

7. On Human Nature. 

SCHOPENHAUER : A Lecture. 

THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF MELANCHTHON. 

{.Shortly, 



WHAT IS CHRISTIANITY? 

Sixteen ^Lectures 

Delivered in the University of Berlin during the 
Winter Term, 1899- [900 



BY 

ADOLF HARNACK 

:» 

PROFESSOR OF CHURCH HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 

AND MEMBER OF THE ROYAL PRUSSIAN ACADEMY 



Translated into English 

BY 

THOMAS BAILEY SAUNDERS 



THIRD AND REVISED EDITION 



WILLIAMS AND NORGATE 

14 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON 

NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
1904 



llof 



Fh'st Print edy February 190 1 

Second Edition^ September 1901 

Third Revised Edition^ February 1904 



Copyright 1 90 1 in U.S,A, 
6", /*. Putnani^s Sons 






^ 






1 



4 



AUTHORS PREFACE TO THE 
ENGLISH EDITION 

To meet the wishes of my English friends I have assented 
to the publication of these Lectures in English as well as in 
German, and as my esteemed friend Mr Bailey Saunders 
was so self-denying and obliging as to undertake the trans- 
lation of them, I was sure of their being in the best hands. 
Whether there is as great a need in England as there is in 
Germany for a short and plaint statement of the Gospel and 
its history, I do not know. But this I know : the theologians 
of every country only half discharge their didies if they think it 
enough to treat of the Gospel in the recondite language of 
learning and bury it in scholarly folios. 

A. HARNACK. 

Berlin, October 1900, 



TRANSLATORS PREFACE 

TO THE FIRST EDITION 

The following Lectures were delivered extempore to a class 
of some six hundred students drawn from all the Faculties in 
the University of Berlin. An enthusiastic listener took them 
down in shorthand, and at the close surprised Professor Har- 
nack with a complete report of what he had said. A few 
alterations sufficed to transform the Lectui^es into a book, and 
German readers everywhere were thus happily enabled to share 
in some of the privileges of the original audience. 

I deem it an honour to have any hand in offering to my 
fellow-countrymen a similar advantage. Goethe, ivriting in his 
last years to Carlyle, described translators, in grandiloquent 
language, as the agents of intellectual commerce among the 
nations. The duties of such agency in regard to the contents 
of this volume I have done my best to discharge, convinced 
as I am that in the traffic in ideas between Germany and the 
English-speaking peoples all over the world both the matter 
of Professor Harnack's discourse and the spirit in which he 
treats it are alike worthy of attention. 
London, November 1900. 

TO THE THIRD EDITION 

As a third edition of this work is required I have revised 
the translation, and I hope that I may have rendered it 



Vlll 



Preface 



clearer than it was previously. For some of the improve- 
ments I am indebted to friends. 

That these Lectures have been worth the attention of the 
English-speaking peoples is shown by the admiration which 
they have everywhere won from good judges of their learning, 
their eloquence, and their sincerity. But, as was to be ex- 
pected, they have also provoked much dissent. The objections 
raised to them in England do not seem, to me at least, equal 
in force or in interest to those raised elsewhere, but, whatever 
their value, I have endeavoured to meet them in a little book 
called Professor Harnack and his Oxford Critics. 

'^ Afler a period of specialisation,'' writes Professor Har- 
nack in his preface to a new edition oj^ the original, ^^ we 
are about to enter upon a synthetic age, in which it is easier 
for religion to obtain a hearing. May these Lectures be 
destined to help in making the new synthesis clear and pro- 
found, an emancipating and a civilising influence.'' 

London, January 1904. 

T. BAILEY SAUNDERS. 



Contents 



PAGE 

^ General Scope of the Lectures .... 1 

I. THE GOSPEIs: Preliminaiy. 

(i.) The Leading Features of Jesus' Message . 52 
The kingdom of God and its coming . 53 
God the Father and the infinite value of 

the human soul . .... 65 

The higher righteousness and the com- 
mandment of love .... 72 

(ii.) The Gospel in Relation to Certain 

Problems ...... 80 

The Gospel and the worlds or the 

question of asceticism . . .81 

The Gospel and the poor^ or the social 

question ...... 90 

The Gospel and law^ or the question of 

public order . . . . .105 

The Gospel and work^ or the question 

of civilisation . . . . .120 

The Gospel and the Son of God^ or the 

Christological question . . .127 

The Gospel and doctrine, or the question 

of creed 149 

ix ^ 



Contents 



PAGE 

II. THE GOSPEL IN HISTORY. 

The Christian Religion (i.) in the Apostolic 

Age . .155 

„ ,y „ (ii.) IN its Develop- 

ment INTO 
Catholicism . 193 

„ yy y, (iii.) IN Greek Catho- 

licism . . 220 

yy ,y „ (iv. ) IN RoMAN CaTHO" 

LICISM . . 249 

,, „ ,, (v.) IN Protestantism 272 



WHAT IS CHRISTIANITY? 



LECTURE L 

The great English philosopher, John Stuart Mill, has 
somewhere observed that mankind cannot be too often 
reminded that there was once a man of the name of 
Socrates. That is true ; but still more important is it 
to remind mankind again and again that a man of the 
name of Jesus Christ once stood in their midst. The 
fact, of course, has been brought home to us from our 
youth up ; but unhappily it cannot be said that public 
instruction in our time is calculated to preserve the 
image of Jesus Christ for us in any impressive way, and 
as an inalienable possession after our schooldays are 
over and for our whole life. And even though no one 
who has once absorbed a ray of Christ's light can ever 
again become as though he had never heard of him ; 
even though in the depths of every soul that has been 
once touched an impression may remain, still a confused 
recollection of this kind, which is often only a " super- 
stitio,*" is not enough to give strength and life. Should 



2 What is Christianity? 

the desire, however, for further and more trustworthy 
knowledge about him arise, and a man want positive 
information as to who Jesus Christ was, and as to the 
real purport of his message, he no sooner asks for it 
than he finds himself, if he consults the literature of 
the day, surrounded by a clatter of contradictory voices. 
He hears some people maintaining that primitive 
Christianity was closely akin to Buddhism, and he is 
accordingly told that it is in fleeing the world and in 
pessimism that the sublime character of this religion 
and its profound meaning are revealed. Others, on the 
contrary, assure him that Christianity is an optimistic 
religion, and that it must be thought of simply and 
solely as a higher phase of Judaism ; and they, too, 
also suppose that in saying this they have said some- 
thing very profound. Others, again, maintain the 
opposite ; they assert that the Gospel did away with 
Judaism, and that it itself originated under Greek 
influences of mysterious operation, and is to be under- 
stood as a blossom on the tree of Hellenism. Religious 
philosophers come forward and declare that the 
metaphysical system which, as they say, was developed 
out of the Gospel, is its real kernel and the revelation 
of its secret ; but others reply that the Gospel has 
nothing to do with philosophy, that it was meant for 
feeling and suffering humanity, and that philosophy 
has only been forced upon it. Finally, the newest 
critics of all step into the field and assure us that the 



Preliminary 3 

whole history of religion, morality, and philosophy is 
nothing but clothes and finery ; that what at all times 
underlies them, as the only real motive power, is the 
history of economics; that, accordingly, Christianity, 
too, was in its origin nothing more than a social move- 
ment and Christ a social deliverer — the deliverer of the 
oppressed lower classes. 

It is somewhat touching to observe how anxious 
everyone is to rediscover himself, together with his own 
point of view and his own circle of interest, in this 
Jesus Christ, or at least to get a share in him. It is 
the perennial repetition of the spectacle which was seen 
even as early as the second century in the " Gnostic "''' 
movement, and which takes the form of a struggle, on 
the part of every conceivable tendency of thought, for 
the possession of Jesus Christ. Why, quite recently, 
not only, I think, Tolstoi's ideas, but even Nietzsche's, 
have been exhibited in their special affinity with the 
Gospel ; and there is perhaps more to be said even upon 
this subject that is worth attention than upon the 
connexion between a good deal of " theological "" and 
" philosophical '' speculation and Christ's teaching. 

But nevertheless, when taken together, the impression 
which these contradictory opinions convey is dishearten- 
ing : the confusion seems hopeless. How can we take 
it amiss of anyone if, after trying to find out how the 
question stands, he gives it up ? Perhaps he may go 
further, and declare that after all the question does not 



4 What is Christianity? 

matter. How are we concerned with events that 
happened, or with a person who hved, nineteen 
hundred years ago ? We must look for om- ideals and 
our strength to the present ; to evolve them laboriously 
out of old manuscripts is a fantastic proceeding that 
can lead nowhere. The man who so speaks is not 
wrong; but neither is he right. What we are and 
what we possess, in any high sense, we possess from the 
past and by the past — only so much of it, of course, 
as has had results and makes its influence felt up to the 
present day. To acquire a sound knowledge of the 
past is the business and the duty, not only of the 
historian but also of every one who wishes to make the 
wealth and the strength so gained his own. But that 
the Gospel is a part of this past which nothing else can 
replace has been affirmed again and again by the 
greatest minds. " Let intellectual and spiritual culture 
progress, and the human mind expand, as much as it 
will ; beyond the grandeur and the moral elevation of 
Christianity, as it sparkles and shines in the Gospels, 
the human mind will not advance.'** So spoke Goethe, 
after making many experiments and labouring inde- 
fatigably at himself ; so it was that he sunnned up the 
result to which his moral and historical insight led him. 
Even though we were to feel no desire on our own 
part, it would still be worth while, because of this man's 
testimony, to devote our serious attention to what he 
came to regard as so precious ; and if, contrary to his 



Preliminary 5 

declaration, louder and more confident voices are heard 
to-day, proclaiming that the Christian religion has 
outlived itself, let us accept this as an invitation to 
make a closer acquaintance with the religion whose 
certificate of death people suppose that they can 
already exhibit. 

But in truth this religion and the efforts which it 
evokes are more active to-day than they used to be. 
We may say to the credit of our age that it takes an 
eager interest in the problem of the nature and value of 
Christianity, and that there is more study and inquiry 
in regard to this subject now than was the case thirty 
years ago. Even in the attempts that people make to 
feel their way in it, the strange and abstruse replies 
that are given to questions, the manner in which it is 
caricatured, the chaotic confusion which it exhibits, nay, 
even in the hatred that it excites, a real life and an 
earnest endeavour may be traced. Only do not let 
-us suppose that there is anything exemplary in this 
endeavour, and that we are the first to shake off an 
authoritative religion and struggle after one that shall 
really make us free and be of independent growth — 
a struggle which must of necessity give rise to much 
confusion and half-truth. Sixty-two years ago Carlyle 
wrote : — " In these distracted times, when the Religious 
Principle, driven out of most Churches, either lies un- 
seen in the hearts of good men, looking and longing 
and silently working there towards some new Revela- 



6 What is Christianity? 

tion ; or else wanders homeless over the world, like a 
disembodied soul seeking its terrestrial organisation, — 
into how many strange shapes, of Superstition and 
Fanaticism, does it not tentatively and errantly cast 
itself ! The higher Enthusiasm of man's nature is for 
the while without Exponent ; yet does it continue in- 
destructible, unweariedly active, and work blindly in 
the great chaotic deep : thus Sect after Sect, and Church 
after Church, bodies itself forth, and melts again into 
new metamorphosis.*" 

No one who understands the times in which we live 
can deny that these words sound as if they had been 
written to-day. But it is not with "the religious 
principle "" and the ways in which it has developed that 
we are going to concern ourselves in these lectures. 
We shall try to answer the more modest but not less 
pressing question, What is Christianity ? What was 
it ? What has it become ? The answer to this question 
may, we hope, also throw light by the way on the more 
comprehensive one. What is Religion, and what ought 
it to be to us ? In dealing with religion, is it not after 
all with the Christian religion alone that we have to 
do ? Other religions no longer stir the depths of 
our hearts. 

What is Christianity ? It is solely in its historical 
sense that we shall try to answer this question here ; 
that is to say, we shall employ the methods of historical 



I 



Preliminary 7 

science and the experience of life gained by witnessing 
the actual course of history. We thus exclude the 
view of the question taken by the apologist and the 
religious philosopher. On this point permit me to say 
a few words. 

Apologetics holds a necessary place in religious know- 
ledge, and to demonstrate the validity of the Christian 
religion and exhibit its importance for the moral and 
intellectual life is a great and a worthy undertaking. 
But it is one which must not be confounded with the 
purely historical question as to the nature of that 
religion, or else historical research will be brought into 
complete discredit. Moreover, in the kind of apologetics 
that is now required no really high standard has as yet 
been set. Apart from a few steps that have been taken 
in the direction of improvement, this whole subject of 
study is in a deplorable state : it is not clear as to the 
positions to be defended, and it is uncertain as to the 
means to be employed. It is also not infrequently 
pursued in an undignified and obtrusive fashion. 
Apologists imagine that they are doing a great work by 
crying up religion as though it were a job-lot at a sale, 
or a universal remedy for all social ills. They are 
perpetually snatching, too, at all sorts of baubles, so as 
to make religion cut a fine figure. In their endeavour 
to present it as a glorious necessity, they deprive it of 
its earnest character, and at the best only prove that it 
is something which may be safely accepted because it 



f 



8 What is Christianity? 

can do no harm. Finally, they cannot refrain from 
slipping in some church programme of yesterday, and 
"demonstrating"'' its claims as well; for the structure 
of their ideas is so loose that an idea or two more 
makes no difference. The mischief that has been 
thereby done already and is still being done is in- 
describable. No ! the Christian religion is something 
simple and sublime ; it means one thing and one thing 
only : Eternal life in the midst of time, by the strength 
and under the eyes of God. It is no ethical or social 
arcanum for the preservation or improvement of things 
generally. To make what it has done for civilisation 
and human progress the main question, and to deter- 
mine its value by the answer, is to do it violence at the 
start. Goethe once said, " Mankind is always advancing, 
and man always remains the same.'*'' It is to man that 
religion pertains — to man, as one who in the midst of all 
change and progress himself never changes. Christian 
apologetics must recognise, then, that it is with religion 
in its simple nature and its simple strength that it has 
to do. Religion, to be sure, does not exist for itself 
alone ; it lives in an inner fellowship with all the 
activities of the mind and with moral and economical 
conditions as well. But it is emphatically not a mere 
function or an exponent of them ; it is a mighty power 
that sets to work of itself, hindering or furthering, 
destroying or making fruitful. The main thing is to 
learn what religion is and in what its essential character 



Preliminary 9 

consists — no matter what position the individual who 
examines it may take up in regard to it, or whether in 
his own Hfe he values it or not. 

But the point of view of the philosophical theorist, 
in the strict sense of the word, will also find no place in 
these lectures. Had they been delivered sixty years ago, 
it would have been our endeavour to arrive by specu- 
lative reasoning at some general conception of religion, 
and then try to define the Christian religion accordingly. 
But we have rightly become sceptical about the value 
of this procedure. Latet dolus in generalibus. We 
know to-day that life cannot be spanned by general 
conceptions, and that there is no general conception of 
religion to which actual religions are related simply and 
solely as species to genus. Nay, the question may even 
be asked whether there is any such generic conception 
as " religion "" at all. Is the common element in it 
anything more than a vague disposition ? Is it only 
an empty spot in our innermost being that the word 
denotes, which every one fills up in a different fashion, 
and many do not perceive at all ? I am not of this 
opinion ; I am convinced, rather, that at bottom we 
have to do here with something which is common to us 
all, and which in the course of history has struggled up 
out of torpor and discord into unity and light. I am 
convinced that Augustine is right when he says, " Thou, 
Lord, hast made us for Thyself, and our heart is restless 
until it finds rest in Thee.'' But to prove that this is 



lo What is Christianity? 

so ; to exhibit the nature and the claims of religion by 
psychological analysis, including the psychology of 
peoples, is not the task that we shall undertake in what 
follows. We shall keep to the purely historical theme : 
What is the Christian religion ? 

Where are we to look for our materials ? The answer 
seems to be simple and at the same time exhaustive : 
Jesus Christ and his Gospel, But however little doubt 
there may be that this must form not only our point of 
departure but also the matter with which our investi- 
gations will mainly deal, it is equally certain that we 
must not be content to exhibit the mere image of Jesus 
Christ and the main features of his Gospel. We must 
not be content to stop there, because every great and 
powerful personality reveals a part of what it is only 
when seen in those whom it influences. Nay, it may 
be said that the more powerful the personality which a 
man possesses, and the more he takes hold of the inner 
life of others, the less can the sum-total of what he is 
be known only by what he himself says and does. We 
must look at the reflection and the effects which he 
produced in those whose leader and master he became. 
That is why a complete answer to the question. What 
is Christianity ? is impossible so long as we are restricted 
to Jesus Christ's teaching alone. We must include the 
first generation of his disciples as well — those who ate 
and drank with him — and we must listen to what they 
tell us of the eft'ect which he had upon their lives, 



4 



The Gospel ii 

But even this does not exhaust our materials. If 
Christianity is an example of a great power valid not 
for one particular epoch alone ; if in and through it, 
not once only, but again and again, great forces have 
been disengaged, we must include all the later products 
of its spirit. It is not a question of a " doctrine '** being 
handed down by uniform repetition or arbitrarily dis- 
torted ; it is a question of a life^ again and again kindled 
afresh, and now burning v/ith a flame of its own. We 
may also add that Christ himself and the apostles were 
convinced that the religion which they were planting , 
would in the ages to come have a greater destiny and 
a deeper meaning than it possessed at the time of its 
institution ; they trusted to its spirit leading from one 
point of light to another and developing higher forces. 
Just as we cannot obtain a complete knowledge of a 
tree without regarding not only its root and its stem 
but also its bark, its branches, and the way in which it . 
blooms, so we cannot form any right estimate of the 
Christian religion unless we take our stand upon a com- 
prehensive induction that shall cover all the facts of its 
history. It is true that Christianity has had its classical 
epoch ; nay more, it had a founder who himself was 
what he taught — to steep ourselves in him is still the 
chief matter ; but to restrict ourselves to him means to 
take a point of view too low for his significance. In- 
dividual religious life was what he wanted to kindle and 
what he did kindle ; it is, as we shall see, his peculiar 



12 What is Christianity? 

greatness to have led men to God, so that they may 
thenceforth hve their own Hfe with Him. How, then, 
can we be silent about the history of the Gospel if we 
wish to know what he was ? 

It may be objected that put in this way the problem 
is too difficult, and that its solution threatens to be 
accompanied by many errors and defects. That is not 
to be denied ; but to state a problem in easier terms, 
that is to say in this case inaccurately, because of the 
difficulties surrounding it, would be a very perverse 
expedient. Moreover, even though the difficulties 
increase, the work is, on the other hand, facilitated by 
the problem being stated in a larger manner ; for it 
helps us to grasp what is essential in the phenomena, 
and to distinguish kernel and husk. 

Jesus Christ and his disciples were situated in their 
day just as we are situated in ours; that is to say, 
their feelings, their thoughts, their judgments and their 
efforts were bounded by the horizon and the framework 
in which their own nation was set and by its condition 
at the time. Had it been otherwise, they would not 
have been men of flesh and blood, but mere spectres. 
For seventeen hundred years, indeed, people thought, 
and many among us still think, that the '' humanity " 
of Jesus Christ, which is a part of their creed, is suffi- 
ciently provided for by the assumption that he had a 
human body and a human soul. As if it were possible 
to have that without having any definite character as 



The Gospel 13 

an individual ! To be a man means, in the first place, 
to possess a certain mental and spiritual disposition, 
determined in such and such a way, and thereby limited 
and circumscribed ; and, in the second place, it means 
to be situated, with this disposition, in a historical 
environment which in its turn is also limited and 
circumscribed. Anything beyond this means to be not 
"a man/' It at once follows, then, that no one can 
think, speak, or do anything at all without his peculiar 
disposition and his own age coming in as factors. A 
single word may seem to be really classical and valid 
for all time, and yet the very language in which it is 
spoken gives it very palpable limitations. Much less is , 
a spiritual personality, as a whole, susceptible of being 
represented in a way that will banish the feeling of its 
limitations, and with those limitations, the sense of 
something strange or conventional ; and this feeling 
must necessarily be enhanced the farther in point of 
time the spectator is removed. 

From these circumstances it follows that the 
historian, whose business and highest duty it is to 
determine what is of permanent value, is of necessity 
required not to cleave to words but to find out loliat is 
essential. The " whole '' Christ, the " whole "" Gospel, if 
we mean by this motto the external image taken in all 
its details and set up for imitation, is just as bad and 
deceptive a shibboleth as the " whole "** Luther, and the 
like. It is bad because it enslaves us, and it is deceptive 



14 What is Christianity? 

because the people who proclaim it do not think of 
taking it seriously, and could not do so if they tried. 
They cannot do so because they cannot cease to feel, 
understand and judge as children of their age. 

There are only two possibilities here: either the 
Gospel is in all respects identical with its earliest form, in 
which case it came with its time, and with its time has 
departed ; or else it contains something which, under 
differing historical forms, is of permanent validity. The 
latter is the true view. The history of the Church shows 
us in its very commencement that " primitive Christi- 
anity '*'* had to disappear in order that " Christianity " 
might remain ; and in the same way in later ages 
one metamorphosis followed upon another. From the 
beginning it was a question of getting rid of formulas, 
correcting expectations, altering ways of feeling, and this 
is a process to which there is no end. But by the very 
fact that our survey embraces the whole course as well 
as the inception, we enhance our standard of what is 
essential and of real value. 

We enhance our standard — but we need not wait to 
take it from the history of those later ages. The thing 
itself reveals it. We shall see that the Gospel in the 
Gospel is something so simple, something that speaks to 
us with so much power, that it cannot easily be mistaken. 
Comprehensive and methodical directions and general 
introductions are unnecessary to enable us to find 
the way to it. No one who possesses a fresh eye for 



The Gospel 15 

what is alive, and true feeling for what is really great, 
can fail to see it and distinguish it from its contem- 
porary integument. And even though there may 
be many individual aspects of it where the task 
of distinguishing what is permanent from what is 
fleeting, what is rudimentary from what is merely 
historical, is not quite easy, we must not be like 
the child who wanted to get at the kernel of a 
bulb, went on picking off the leaves until there was 
nothing left, and in the end could not help seeing 
that it was just the leaves that made the bulb. En- 
deavours of this kind are not unknown in the history of 
the Christian religion, but they are thrown into the 
shade by others which seek to convince us that there is 
no such thing as either kernel or husk, growth or decay, 
but that everything is of equal value and alike 
permanent. 

In these lectures, then, we shall deal first of all with 
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and this theme will occupy 
the greater part of our attention. We shall then show 
what impression he himself and his Gospel made upon 
the first generation of his disciples. Finally, we shall 
follow the leading changes which the Christian idea has 
undergone in the course of history, and try to recognise , 
its chief types. What is common to all the forms which 
it has taken, corrected by reference to the Gospel, and, 
conversely, the chief features of the Gospel, corrected 
by reference to history, will, we may be allowed to hope, 



1 6 What is Christianity? 

bring us to the kernel of the matter. Within the limits 
of a short series of lectures it is, of course, only to what 
is important that attention can be called ; but perhaps 
there will be no disadvantage in fixing our attention, 
for once, only on the strong lines and prominent points 
of the relief, and, with everything secondary put into 
the background, looking at the vast material in a 
concentrated form. We shall even refrain, and per- 
missibly refrain, from enlarging, by way of introduction, 
on Judaism and its external and internal relations, and 
on the Graeco-Roman world. We must never, of 
course, wholly shut our eyes to them — nay, we must 
always keep them in mind ; but we need not go into 
them at any great length. Jesus Christ's teaching will 
at once bring us by steps which, if few, will be large, to 
a height where its connexion with Judaism will appear 
only a loose one, and most of the threads leading from 
it into " contemporary history '''' become of no import- 
ance at all. This may seem a paradoxical thing to say ; 
for just now we are being earnestly assured, with an air 
as though it were some new discovery that was being 
imparted to us, that Jesus Christ's teaching cannot be 
understood, nay, cannot be accurately represented, 
except by having regard to its connexion with the 
Jewish doctrines prevalent at the time, and by first of 
all setting them out in full. There is much that is 
true in this statement, and yet, as we shall see, it is 
incorrect. It becomes absolutely false, however, when 



The Gospel 17 

worked up into the dazzling thesis that the Gospel is 
intelligible only as the religion of a despairing section 
of the Jewish nation ; that it was the last effort of a 
decadent age, driven by distress into a renunciation of 
this earth, and then trying to storm heaven and demand- 
ing civic rights there — a religion of miserabilism ! It 
is rather remarkable that the really desperate were just 
those who did not welcome it, but fought against it ; 
remarkable that its leaders, so far as we know them, do 
not, in fact, bear any of the marks of sickly despair ; 
most remarkable of all, that while indeed renouncing the 
world and its goods, they establish, in love and holiness, 
a brotherly union which declares war on the worWs 
misery. The oftener I re-read and consider the 
Gospels, the more do I find that the contemporary dis- 
cords, in the midst of which the Gospel stood, and out 
of which it arose, sink into the background. I enter- 
tain no doubt that even the founder had an eye to man 
in whatever external situation he might be found — 
man who, at bottom, always remains the same, whether 
he be moving upwards or downwards, whether he be 
in riches or poverty, whether he be of strong mind or of 
weak. It is the consciousness of all these oppositions 
being ultimately beneath it, and of its own place above 
them, that gives the Gospel its sovereignty ; for in every 
man it looks to the point that is unaffected by all these 
differences. This is very clear in Paul''s case ; he domi- 
nates all earthly things and circumstances like a king. 



i8 What is Christianity? 

and desires to see them so dominated. The thesis of 
the decadent age and the religion of the wretched may 
serve to lead us into the outer court ; it may even 
correctly point to that which originally gave the 
Gospel its form ; but if it is offered us as a key for the 
understanding of this religion in itself, we must reject 
it. Moreover, this thesis and the pretensions which 
it makes are only illustrations of a fashion which has 
become general in the writing of history, and which 
in that province will naturally have a longer reign 
than other fashions, because by its means light can, in 
fact, be thrown upon much that was obscure. But its 
devotees do not get at the kernel, assuming, as they 
silently do, that no such kernel exists. 

Let me conclude this lecture by touching briefly 
on one other important point. In history absolute 
judgments are impossible. This is a truth which in 
these days — I say advisedly, in these days — is clear and 
incontestable. History can only show how things 
have been ; and even where we can throw light upon 
the past, and understand and criticise it, we must not 
presume to think that by any process of abstraction 
absolute judgments as to the value to be assigned to 
past events can be obtained from the results of a 
purely historical survey. Such judgments are the 
creation only of feeling and of will ; they are a subjec- 
tive act. The false notion that the understanding can 
produce them is a heritage of that protracted epoch in 



The Gospel 1-9 

which knowing and knowledge were expected to accom- 
plish everything ; in which it was believed that they 
could be stretched so as to be capable of covering and 
satisfying all the needs of the mind and the heart. 
That they cannot do. This is a truth which, in many 
an hour of ardent work, falls heavily upon our soul, 
and yet — what a hopeless thing it would be for man- 
kind if the higher peace to which it aspires, and the 
clearness, the certainty and the strength for which 
it strives, were dependent on the measure of its learning 
and its knowledge. 



LECTURE 11. 

Our first section deals with the main features of t]}0 
message delivered by Jesus Christ, In these is also 
included the way in which he delivered his message. 
We shall see how essential a part of his character is here 
exhibited, for " he spoke as one having authority and 
not as the Scribes."" But before describing these features 
I feel it my duty to tell you briefly how matters stand 
in regard to the sources of our knowledge. 

Apart from some important information given by 
the apostle Paul, our authorities for the message which 
Jesus Christ delivered are the first three Gospels. 
Everything that we know, independently of these 
Gospels, about Jesus' history and his teaching, may be 
easily put on a small sheet of paper, so little does it 
come to. In particular, the fourth Gospel, which does not 
emanate or profess to emanate from the apostle John, 
cannot be taken as a historical authority in the 
ordinary meaning of the word. The author of it acted 
with sovereign freedom, transposed events and put them 
in a new light, drew up the discourses himself,, and illus- 
trated great thoughts by imaginary situations. Although, 

20 



The Gospel 21 

therefore, his work is not altogether devoid of a real, if 
scarcely recognisable, traditional element, it can hardly 
make any claim to be considered an authority for Jesus'* 
history ; only little of what he says can be accepted, and 
that little with caution. On the other hand, it is an 
authority of the first rank for answering the question, 
What vivid views of Jesus' person, what kind of light 
and warmth, did the Gospel disengage ? 

Sixty years ago David Friedrich Strauss thought 
that he had almost entirely destroyed the historical 
credibility not only of the fourth but also of the first 
three Gospels as well. The historical criticism of two 
generations has succeeded in restoring that credibility 
in its main outlines. These Gospels are not, it is true, 
historical works any more than the fourth ; they were 
not written with the simple object of giving the facts 
as they were ; they are books composed for the work of 
evangelisation. Their purpose is to awaken a belief in 
Jesus Christ's person and mission ; and the purpose is 
served by the description of his deeds and discourses, as 
well as by the references to the Old T^estament. Never- 
theless they are not useless as sources of history, more 
especially as the object with which they were written is 
not supplied from without, but coincides in part with 
what Jesus intended. Such other great leading purposes, 
however, as have been ascribed to the evangelists have 
one and all proved unfounded, although with each in- 
dividual evangelist many secondary purposes may have 



22 What is Christianity? 

come into play. The Gospels are not " party tracts '''* ; 
neither are they writings which as yet bear the radical 
impress of the Greek spirit. In their essential substance 
they belong to the first, the Jewish, epoch of Christianity, 
that brief epoch which may be denoted as the palaeonto- 
logical. That we possess any reports dating from that 
time, even though, as is obvious in the first and third 
Gospels, the setting and composition are by another 
hand, is one of those historical arrangements for which 
we cannot be too thankful. Criticism to-day universally 
recognises the unique character of the Gospels. What 
especially marks them off from all subsequent literature 
is the way in which they tell their story. This species 
of literary art, which took shape partly by analogy with 
the didactic narratives of the Jews, ted partly from 
catechetical necessities — this simple an(i^jp.pressive form 
of exposition was, even a few decades later, no longer 
capable of reproduction. From the time that the 
Gospel was transferred to the broad ground of the Graeco- 
Roman world it appropriated the literary forms of the 
Greeks, and the style of the evangelists was then felt 
to be something strange but sublime. But when all 
is said, the Greek language lies'^ipon these writings 
only like a diaphanous veil, and it requires hardly any 
effort to retranslate their contents into Hebrew or 
Aramaic. That the tradition here presented to us is, 
in the main, at first hand, is obvious. 

How fixed was this tradition in point of form is 



The Gospel 23 

proved by the third Gospel. It was composed by a 
Greek, probably in the time of Domitian ; and in the 
second part of his work, the Acts of the Apostles, 
he shows, what he had already shown in the preface to 
the first, that he was familiar with the literary language 
of his nation and that he was an excellent master of 
style. But in the Gospel narrative he did not dare to 
abandon the traditional type ; he tells his story in the 
same style as Mark and Matthew, with the same con- 
nexion of sentences, the same colour, nay, in many 
cases with the same details ; it is only the ruder words 
and expressions, which would offend literary taste, that 
are sparingly corrected. There is another aspect, too, 
in which his Gospel strikes us as remarkable : he 
assures us at the beginning of it that he has " had 
perfect understanding of all things from the very first,"" 
and has examined many accounts. But if we test him 
by his authorities, we find that he has kept in the 
main to Mark's Gospel, and to a source which we also 
find appearing' again in Matthew. These accounts 
both seemed to him, as a respectable chronicler, to be 
preferable to the crowd of others. That offers a 
good guarantee for them. No historian has found that 
it is possible or necessary to substitute any other 
tradition for the one which we have here. 

Another point : this tradition is, apart from the 
story of the Passion, almost exclusively Galilean in its 
character. Had not the history of Jesus" public 



24 What is Christianity? 

activity been really governed by this geographical 
horizon, tradition could not have so described it ; for 
every historical narrative with an eye to effect would 
have represented him as working chiefly in Jerusalem. 
That is the account given by the fourth Gospel. That 
our first three evangelists almost entirely refrain from 
saying anything about Jerusalem arouses "a good 
prejudice"" in their favour. 

It is true that, measured by the standard of " agree- 
ment, inspiration and completeness,'*'* these writings 
leave a very great deal to be desired, and even when 
judged by a more human standard they suffer from not 
a few imperfections. Rude additions from a later age 
they do not, indeed, exhibit — it will always remain a 
noteworthy fact that, conversely, it is only the fourth 
Gospel which makes Greeks ask after Jesus — but still 
they, too, reflect, here and there, the circumstances in 
which the primitive Christian community was placed 
and the experiences which it afterwards underwent. 
People nowadays, however, resort to such explanations 
more readily than is necessary. Further, the conviction 
that Old Testament prophecy was fulfilled in Jesus'* 
history had a disturbing eft'ect on tradition. Lastly, 
in some of the narratives the miraculous element is 
obviously intensified. On the other hand, Strauss'* 
contention that the Gospels contain a very great deal 
that is mythical has not been borne out, even if the 
very indefinite and defective conception of what 



The Gospel 25 

" mythical " means in Strauss' application of the word 
be allowed to pass. It is almost exclusively in the 
account of Jesus' childhood, and there only sparingly, 
that a mythical touch can be traced. None of these 
disturbing elements affect the heart of the narrative ; 
not a few of them easily lend themselves to correction, 
partly by a comparison of the Gospels one with another, 
partly through the sound judgment that is matured by 
historical study. 

But the miraculous element, all these reports of 
miracles ! Not Strauss only, but many others too, 
have allowed themselves to be frightened by them into 
roundly denying the credibility of the Gospels. But, 
on the other hand, historical science in this last genera- 
tion has taken a great step in advance by learning to 
pass a more intelligent and benevolent judgment on 
those narratives, and accordingly even reports of the 
marvellous can now be counted amongst the materials 
of history and turned to good account. I owe it to you 
and to the subject briefly to specify the position which 
historical science to-day takes up in regard to these 
reports. 

In the first place, we know that the Gospels come 
from a time in which the marvellous may be said 
to have been something of almost daily occurrence. 
People felt and saw that they were surrounded by 
wonders, and not by any means only in the religious 
sphere. Certain spiritualists among us excepted, we 



26 What is Christianity? 

are now accustomed to associate the question of miracles 
exclusively with the question of religion. In those 
days it was otherwise. The fountains of the marvellous 
were many ; but while some sort of divinity was, of 
course, supposed to be at work in every case — it was 
a god who accomplished the miracle — it was not to 
every god that people stood in a religious relation. 
Further, in those days, the strict conception which we 
now attach to the word " miracle '*'' was as yet unknown ; 
it came in only with a knowledge of the laws of Nature 
and their general validity. Before that, no sound 
insight existed into what was possible and what was 
impossible, what was rule and what was exception. 
But where this distinction is not clear, or where, as the 
case may be, the question has never been raised at all 
in any rigorous form, there are no such things as 
miracles in the strict sense of the word. No one can 
feel anything to be an interruption of the order of 
Nature who does not yet know what the order of Nature 
is. Miracles, then, could not possess the significance 
for that age which, if they existed, they would possess 
for ours. For that age all wonders were only extra- 
ordinary events, and, even if they formed a world by 
themselves, it was certain that there were countless 
points in which that other world mysteriously encroached 
upon our own. Nor was it only God^s messengers, but 
magicians and charlatans as well, who were thought to 
be possessed of some of these miraculous powers. The 



The Miraculous Element 27 

significance attaching to " miracles " was, therefore, in 
those days a subject of never-ending controversy; at 
one moment a high vakie was set upon them and they 
were considered to belong to the very essence of religion ; 
at another, they were spoken of with contempt. 

In the second place, we now know that eminent 
persons have not to wait until they have been long dead, 
or even for several years, to have miracles reported of 
them ; they are reported at once, often the very next 
day. The habit of condemning a narrative, or of 
ascribing it to a later age, only because it includes 
stories of miracles, is a piece of prejudice. 

In the third place, we are firmly convinced that 
what happens in space and time is subject to the general 
laws of motion, and that in this sense, as an interruption 
of the order of Nature, there can be no such things as 
" miracles." But we also recognise that the religious 
man — if religion really permeates him and is something 
more than a belief in the religion of others — is certain 
that he is not shut up within a blind and brutal course 
of Nature, but that this course of Nature serves higher 
ends, or, as it may be, that some inner and divine 
power can help us so to encounter it as that " everything 
must necessarily be for the best.''" This experience, 
which I might express in one word as the ability to 
escape from the power and the service of transitory 
things, is always felt afresh to be a miracle each time 
that it occurs ; it is inseparable from every higher 



28 What is Christianity? 

religion, and were it to be surrendered religion would 
be at an end. But it is an experience which is as true 
of the life of the individual as it is of the great course 
of human history. How clearly and logically, then, 
must a religious man think, if, in spite of this experience, 
he holds firmly to the inviolable character of what 
happens in space and time. Who can wonder that 
even great minds fail to keep the two spheres quite 
separate ? And as we all live, first and foremost, in 
the domain, not of ideas but of perceptions, and in a 
language of metaphor, how can we avoid conceiving 
what is divine and what makes us free as a mighty 
power working upon the order of Nature, and breaking 
through or arresting it ? This notion, though it belong 
only to the realm of fantasy and metaphor, will, it 
seems, last as long as religion itself. 

In the fourth place, and lastly, although the order 
of Nature be inviolable, we are not yet by any means 
acquainted with all the forces working in it and acting 
reciprocally with other forces. Our acquaintance even 
with the forces inherent in matter, and with the field 
of their action, is incomplete ; while of psychic forces 
we know very much less. We see that a strong will 
and a firm faith exert an influence upon the life of 
the body, and produce phenomena which strike us as 
marvellous. Has anyone ever yet drawn any sure line 
between the spheres of the possible and the actual ? 
Who can say how far the influence of soul upon soul 



The Miraculous Element 29 

and of soul upon body reaches ? No one. Who can 
still maintain that any extraordinary phenomenon that 
may appear in this domain is entirely based on error 
and delusion ? Miracles, it is true, do not happen ; but 
of the marvellous and the inexplicable there is no lack. 
In our present state of knowledge we have become more 
careful, more hesitating in our judgment, in regard to 
the stories of the miraculous which we have received 
from antiquity. That the earth in its course stood 
still ; that a she-ass spoke ; that a storm was quieted 
by a word, we do not believe, and we shall never again 
believe ; but that the lame walked, the blind saw, and 
the deaf heard, will not be so summarily dismissed as 
an illusion. 

From these suggestions you can arrive for yourselves 
at the right position to take up in regard to the mira- 
culous stories related in the Gospels, and at their net 
result. In particular cases — that is to say, in the 
application of general principles to concrete statements 
— some uncertainty will always remain. So far as I 
can judge, the stories may be grouped as follows : — 

(1) Stories which had their origin in an exaggerated 
view of natural events of an impressive character ; 

(2) stories which had their origin in sayings or parables, 
or in the projection of inner experiences on to the ex- 
ternal world ; (3) stories such as arose in the interest 
of seeing Old Testament sayings fulfilled ; (4) stories of 
surprising cures effected by Jesus' spiritual force; 



30 What is Christianity? 

(5) stories of which we cannot fathom the secret. It is 
very remarkable, however, that Jesus himself did not 
assign that critical importance to his miraculous deeds 
which even the evangelist Mark and the others all 
attributed to them. Did he not exclaim, in tones of 
complaint and accusation, "Unless ye see signs and 
wonders, ye will not believe "^ ? He who uttered these 
words cannot have held that belief in the wonders 
which he wrought was the right or the only avenue to 
the recognition of his person and his mission ; nay, in 
all essential points he must have thought of them quite 
otherwise than his evangelists. And the remarkable 
fact that these very evangelists, without appreciating 
its range, hand down the statement that Jesus " did 
not many mighty works there because of their un- 
belief,'' shows us, from another and a different side, with 
what caution we must receive these miraculous stories, 
and into what category we must put them. 

It follows from all this that if we want to evade 
the Gospel we must not entrench ourselves behind the 
miraculous stories related by the evangelists. In spite of 
those stories, nay, in part even in them, we are presented 
with a reality which has claims upon our attention. 
Study it, and do not let yourselves be deterred because 
this or that miraculous story strikes you as strange or 
leaves you cold. If there is anything here that you 
find unintelligible, put it quietly aside. Perhaps you 
will have to leave it there for ever ; perhaps the mean- 



The Miraculous Element 31 

ing will dawn upon you later and the story assume a 
significance of which you never dreamt. Once more 
let me say : Do not be deterred. The question of 
miracles is of relative indifference in comparison with 
everything else which is to be found in the Gospels. 
It is not miracles that matter ; the question on which 
everything turns is whether we are helplessly yoked to 
an inexorable necessity, or whether a God exists v>^ho 
rules and governs, and whose power to compel Nature we 
can move by prayer and make a part of our experience. 

Our evangelists, as we know, do not tell us anything 
about the history of Jesus' early development ; they 
tell us only of his public activity. Two of the Gospels 
do, it is true, contain an introductory history (the 
history of Jesus' birth), but we may disregard it ; for 
even if it contained something more trustworthy than 
it does actually contain, it would be as good as useless 
for our purpose. That is to say, the evangelists them- 
selves never refer to it, nor make Jesus himself refer to 
his antecedents. On the contrary, they tell us that 
Jesus' mother and his brethren were completely surprised 
at his coming forward, and did not know what to make 
of it. Paul, too, is silent ; so that we can be sure that 
the oldest tradition knew nothing of any stories of 
Jesus' birth. 

We know nothing of Jesus' history for the first 
thirty years of his life. Is there not a terrible un- 



32 What is Christianity? 

certainty here ? What is there left us if we have to 
begin our task by confessing that we are unable to 
write any life of Jesus ? How can we write the history 
of a man of whose development we know nothing, and 
with only a year or two of whose life we are acquainted ? 
Well, however certain it may be that our materials are 
insufficient for a " biography ,'' they are very weighty 
in other respects, and even their silence on the first 
thirty years is instructive. They are weighty because 
they give us information upon three important points : 
In the first place^ they offer us a plain picture of Jesus'* 
teachings in regard both to its main features and to its 
individual application ; in the second place^ they tell us 
how his life issued in the service of his vocation ; and in 
the third place^ they describe to u^ the impression which 
he made upon his disciples^ and which they transmitted. 

Here, indeed, we have three very important points ; 
nay, they are the points on which everything turns. 
It is because we can get a clear view of them that a 
characteristic picture of Jesus is possible ; or, to speak 
more modestly, that there is some hope for an attempt 
to understand what his aims were, what he was, and 
what he signifies for us. 

As regards the thirty years of silence, we gather from 
our evangelists that Jesus did not think it necessary to 
give his disciples any information about them. But 
much may be said about them negatively. First of all, 
it is very improbable that he went through any Rab- 



Jesus' History 33 

binical school ; he nowhere ^peaks like a man who had 

assimilated any theological culture of a technical kind, 

or learned the art of scholarly exegesis. Compare him 

in this respect with the apostle Paul ; how clearly it 

can be seen from the latter's epistles that he had sat at 

the feet of theological teachers. With Jesus we find 

nothing of the kind ; and hence he caused a stir by 

appearing in the schools and teaching at all. He lived 

and had his being in the sacred writings, but not after 

the manner of a professional teacher. 

Neither can he have had any relations with the 

Essenes, a remarkable order of Jewish monks. Were 

that so, he would have been one of those pupils who 

show their dependence on their teachers by proclaiming 

and doing the opposite of what they have been taught. 

The Essenes made a point of the most extreme purity 

in the eye of the law, and held severely aloof not 

only from the impure but even from those who were a 

little lax in their purity. It is only thus that we can 

understand their living strictly apart, their dwelling in 

particular places, and their practice of frequent ablutions 

every day. Jesus exhibits a complete contrast with 

this mode of life : he goes in search of sinners and eats 

with them. So fundamental a difference alone makes 

it certain that he had nothing to do with the Essenes. 

His aims and the means which he employed divide him 

off from them. If he appears to coincide with them 

in many of his individual injunctions to his disciples, 

3 



34 What is Christianity? 

these are accidental points of contact, as liis motives 
were quite other than theirs. 

Further, unless all appearances are deceptive, no 
stormy crisis, no breach with his past, lies behind the 
period of Jesus' life that we know. In none of his 
sayings or discourses, whether he is threatening and 
punishing or drawing and calling people to him with 
kindness, whether he is speaking of his relation to the 
Father or to the world, can we discover the signs of 
inner revolutions overcome, or the scars of any terrible 
conflict. Everything seems to pour from him naturally, 
as though it could not do otherwise, like a spring from 
the depths of the earth, clear and unchecked in its flow. 
Where shall we find the man who at the age of thirty 
can so speak, if he has gone through bitter struggles — 
struggles of the soul, in which he has ended by burning 
what he once adored, and by adoring what he burned ? 
Where shall we find the man who has broken with 
his past, in order to summon others to repentance as 
well as himself, but who through it all never speaks 
of his own repentance.? This consideration makes 
it impossible that his life could have been spent in 
inner conflict, however little it may have been lacking 
in deep emotion, in temptation, and in doubt. 

One final point : the picture of Jesus'* life and his 
discourses stand in no relation with the Greek spirit. 
That is almost a matter for surprise ; for Galilee was 
full of Greeks, and Greek was then spoken in many of 



Jesus' History 35 

its cities, much as Swedish is nowadays in Finland. 
There were Greek teachers and philosophers there, and 
it is scarcely conceivable that Jesus should have been 
entirely unacquainted with their language. But that 
he was in any way influenced by them, that he was ever 
in touch with the thoughts of Plato or the Porch, even 
though it may have been only in some popular redaction, 
it is absolutely impossible to maintain. Of course if 
religious individualism — God and the soul, the soul 
and its God ; if subjectivism ; if the full self- 
responsibility of the individual ; if the separation of the 
religious from the political — if all this is only Greek, 
then Jesus, too, stands within the sphere of Greek 
development ; then he, too, breathed the pure air of 
Greece and drank from the Greek spring. But it cannot 
be proved that it is only on this one line, only in the 
Hellenic people, that this development took place ; 
nay, it is rather the contrary that can be shown ; other 
nations also advanced to similar states of knowledo-e 
and feeling ; although they mostly did so, it is true, 
only after Alexander the Great had pulled down the 
barriers and fences which kept them apart. For these 
nations, too, no doubt it was in the majority of cases 
the Greek element that was the liberating and pro- 
gressive factor. But I do not believe that the Psalmist 
who uttered the words, " Whom have I in heaven but 
thee ? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside 
thee,"" had ever heard anything of Socrates or of Plato, 



36 What is Christianity? 

Enough : from their silence on the first thirty years 
of Jesus'* life, and from what the evangelists do 7iot 
tell us of the period of his activity, there are important 
thino-s to be learnt. 



'&" 



He lived in religion, and it was breath to him in 
the fear of God ; his whole life, all his thoughts and 
feelings, were absorbed in the relation to God ; and yet 
he did not talk like an enthusiast and a fanatic, who 
sees only one red-hot spot, and so is blind to the world 
and all that it contains. He spoke his message and 
looked at the world with a fresh and clear eye for the 
life, great and small, that surrounded him. He 
proclaimed that to gain the whole world was nothing 
if the soul were injured, and yet he remained kind and 
sympathetic to every living thing. That is the most 
astonishing and the greatest fact about him ! His 
discourses, generally clothed in parables and sayings, 
exhibit every degree of human speech and the whole 
range of the emotions. The sternest tones of passion- 
ate accusation and indignant reproof, nay, even irony, 
he does not despise ; but they nuist have formed the 
exception with him. He is possessed of a quiet, 
uniform, collected demeanour, with everything directed 
to one goal. He never uses any ecstatic language, and 
the tone of stirring prophecy is rare. Entrusted with 
the greatest of all missions, his eye and ear are open to 
every impression of the life around him — a proof of 



Jesus' Teaching 37 

intense calm and absolute certainty. " Mourning and 
weeping, laughing and dancing, wealth and poverty, 
hunger and thirst, health and sickness, children's play 
and politics, gathering and scattering, the leaving of 
home, life in the inn and the return, marriage and 
funeral, the splendid house of the living and the grave 
of the dead, the sower and the reaper in the field, the 
lord of the vintage among his vines, the idle workman 
in the marketplace, the shepherd searching for the 
sheep, the dealer in pearls on the sea, and, then again, 
the woman at home anxious over the barrel of meal and 
the leaven, or the lost piece of money, the widow's 
complaint to the surly official, the earthly food that 
perishes, the mental relation of teacher and pupil, on 
the one side regal glory and the tyrant's lust of power, 
on the other childish innocence and the industry of the 
servant — all these pictures enliven his discourse and 
make it clear even to those who are children in mind." 
They do more than tell us that he spoke in picture and 
parable. They exhibit an inner freedom and a cheerful- 
ness of soul in the midst of the greatest strain, such as 
no prophet ever possessed before him. His eye rests 
kindly upon the flowers and the children, on the lily of 
the field — " Solomon in all his glory is not clothed like 
one of them " — on the birds in the air and the sparrows 
on the housetop. The sphere in which he lived, above 
the earth and its concerns, did not destroy his interest 
in it ; no ! he brought everything in it into relation 



38 What is Christianity? 

with the God whom he knew, and he saw it as protected 
and preserved in Him : " Your Father in heaven feeds 
them.'' The parable is his most famihar form of 
speech. Insensibly, however, parable and sympathy 
with human lot pass into each other. Yet he who 
had not where to lay his head does not speak like one 
who has broken with everything, or like a heroic peni- 
tent, or like an ecstatic prophet, but like a man who has 
rest and peace for his soul, and is able to give life and 
strength to others. He strikes the mightiest notes ; he 
offers men an inexorable alternative ; he leaves them no 
escape ; and yet the strongest emotion seems to come 
naturally to him, and he expresses it as something 
natural ; he clothes it in the language in which a 
mother speaks to her child. 



LECTURE III. 

In the previous lecture we spoke of our evangelists and 
of their silence on the subject of Jesus' early develop- 
ment. We described in brief the mode and character 
of his teaching. We saw that he spoke like a prophet 
and yet not like a prophet. His words breathe peace, 
joy, and certainty. He urges the necessity of struggle 
and decision — " where your treasure is, there will your 
heart be also "^ — and yet the equable calm of the parable 
is over all that he says : under God's sun and the dew 
of heaven everything is to grow and increase until the 
harvest. He lived in the continual consciousness of 
God's presence. His food and drink was to do God's 
will. But — and this seemed to us the greatest thing 
about him and the seal of his inner freedom — he did 
not speak like a heroic penitent, or like an ascetic who 
has turned his back upon the world. His eye rested 
kindly upon the whole world, and he saw it as it was, 
in all its varied and changing colours. He ennobled it 
in his parables ; his gaze penetrated the veil of the 
earthly, and he recognised everywhere the hand of 

the living God. 

39 



40 What is Christianity? 

When he came forward, another was akeady at work 
among the Jewish people : John the Baptist. Within a 
few months a great movement had arisen on the banks of 
the Jordan. It differed altogether from those Messianic 
movements which for several generations had by fits and 
starts kept the nation alive. The Baptist, it is true, 
also proclaimed that the kingdom of God was at hand ; 
and what he meant was nothing less than the day of 
the Lord, the judgment, the end now coming. But the 
day of judgment which John the Baptist announced was 
not the great day when God was going to take ven- 
geance upon the heathen and raise up his own people ; 
it was the day of judgment for this very people that he 
prophesied. " Who hath warned you to flee from the 
wrath to come ? Think not to say within yourselves. 
We have Abraham to our father : for I say unto you 
that God is able of these stones to raise up children 
unto Abraham. And now also the axe is laid unto the 
root of the trees." In that day of judgment it is not 
being children of Abraham, but doing works of right- 
eousness, which is to turn the scale. And he, the 
preacher, himself began with repentance and devoted 
his life to it. He stands before them in raiment of 
camePs hair, and his meat is locusts and wild honey. 
But it is not in the levying of a band of ascetics that 
he sees his work, or at any rate his main work. He 
appeals to the whole nation, busy with its various trades 
and callings, and sunnnons it to repentance. They 



John the Baptist 41 

seem very simple truths that he utters. To the pub- 
hcans he says : " Exact no more than that which is 
appointed you "'' ; to the soldiers : " Do violence to no 
man, neither accuse any falsely, and be content with 
your wages '"' ; to the well-to-do : " He that hath two 
coats, let him impart to him tha,t hath none, and he 
that hath meat, let him do likewise ^^ ; and to all : 
" Forget not the poor.*" This is the practical proof of 
the repentance to which he calls, and it embraces the 
conversion which he has in view. It is not a question 
of a single act, the baptism of repentance, but of a 
righteous life in the face of the avenging justice of 
God. Of ceremonies, sacrifices, and the works of the 
law, John did not speak ; apparently he thought them 
unimportant. It was on a right disposition and good 
deeds that everything turned. In the day of judgment 
it was by this standard that the God of Abraham 
would judge. 

I^et us pause here for a moment. Questions force 
themselves upon us at this point which have often been 
answered and still are again and again put. It is clear 
that John the Baptist proclaimed the sovereignty of 
God and his holy moral law. It is also clear that he 
proclaimed to his fellow-countrymen that it was by the 
moral law that they were to measure, and that on this 
alone everything was to turn. He told them that 
what they were to care about most was to be in a 
right state within and to do good deeds. It is clear, 



42 What is Christianity? 

lastly, there is nothing over-refined or artificial in his 
notion of what was good ; he means ordinary morality. 
It is here that the questions arise. 

Firstly : If it was only so simple a matter as the 
eternal claims of what is right and holy, why all this 
apparatus about the coming of the day of judgment, 
about the axe being laid to the root of the trees, about 
the unquenchable fire, and so on ? 

Secondly: Is not this baptism in the wilderness and 
this giving out that the day of judgment is at hand 
simply the reflection or the product of the political and 
social state of the nation at the time ? 

Thirdly : What is there that was really new in this 
message and had not been already expressed in Judaism ? 

These three questions are very intimately connected 
with one another. 

Firstly, then, as to the whole dramatic eschatological 
apparatus about the coming of the kingdom of God, 
the end being at hand, and so on. Well, every time 
that a man earnestly, and out of the depths of his own 
personal experience, points others to God and to what 
is good and holy, whether it be deliverance or judgment 
that he preaches, it has always, so far as history tells us, 
taken the form of announcing that the end is at hand. 
How is that to be explained ? The answer is not 
difficult. Not only is religion a life in and with God ; 
but, just because it is that, it is also the revelation of 
the meaning and responsibility of life. Every one who 



John the Baptist 43 

has awakened to a sense of religion perceives that, 
without it, the search for such meaning is in vain, and 
that the individual, as well as the multitude, wanders 
aimlessly and falls : " they go astray ; every one turns 
to his own way/^ But the prophet who has become 
conscious of God is filled with terror and agony as he 
recognises that all mankind is sunk in error and indiffer- 
ence. He feels like a traveller who sees his companions 
blindly rushing to the edge of a precipice. He wants 
to call them back at all costs. The time is running 
out ; he can still warn them ; he can still adjure them 
to turn back ; in a single hour, perhaps, all will be lost. 
The time is running out, it is the last moment — this is 
the cry in which, then, in all nations and at all times, 
any energetic call to conversion has been voiced whenever 
a fresh prophet has been granted them. The prophef^s 
gaze penetrates the course of history ; he sees the 
irrevocable end ; and he is filled with boundless astonish- 
ment that the godlessness and blindness, the frivolity 
and indolence, have not long since brought everything 
to utter ruin and destruction. That there is still a 
brief moment left in which conversion is possible seems 
to him the greatest marvel of all, and to be ascribed 
only to God'*s forbearance. But certain it is that the 
end cannot be very far off; This is the way in which 
with every great cry for repentance the idea of the 
approaching end always arises. The individual forms 
in which it shapes itself depend upon contemporary 



44 What is Christianity? 

circumstances and are of subordinate importance. It is 
only the religion which has been built up into an 
intellectual system that does not make this emphasising 
of the end all-important ; without such emphasis no 
actual religion is conceivable, whether it springs up 
anew like a sudden flame or glows in the soul like a 
secret fire. 

I pass now to the second question : whether the 
social and political conditions of the time were not 
causes of the religious movement. Let us see briefly 
where we are. You are aware that at the time of 
which we speak the peaceful days of the Jewish 
theocracy were long past. For two centuries blow 
had followed upon blow ; from the terrible days of 
Antiochus Epiphanes onwards the nation had never had 
any rest. The kingdom of the Maccabees had been set 
up, and through inner strife and external foe had soon 
disappeared again. The Romans had invaded the 
country and had laid their iron hand upon everything. 
The tyranny of that Edomite parvenu, King Herod, 
had robbed the nation of every pleasure in life and 
maimed it in all its members. So far as human fore- 
sight went, it looked as if no improvement in its 
position could ever again be effected ; the lie seemed to 
be given to all the glorious old prophecies ; the end 
appeared to have come. How easy it was at such an 
epoch to despair of all earthly things, and in this despair 
to renounce in utter distress what had once passed as the 



John the Baptist 45 

inseparable accompaniment of the theocracy. How easy 
it was now to declare the earthly crown, political posses- 
sions, prestige and wealth, strenuous effort and struggle, 
to be one and all worthless, and in place of them to look 
to heaven for a completely new kingdom, a kingdom for 
the poor, the oppressed, the weak, and to hope that their 
virtues of gentleness and patience would receive a crown. 
And if for hundreds of years the national God of Israel 
had been undergoing a transformation ; if he had broken 
in pieces the weapons of the mighty, and derided the 
showy worship of his priests ; if he had demanded 
righteous judgment and mercy — what a temptation there 
was to proclaim him as the God who wills to see his 
people in misery that he may then bring them deliver- 
ance ! We can, in fact, with little trouble construct 
the religion and its hopes which seemed of necessity to 
result from the circumstances of the time — a miserabilism 
which clings to the expectation of a miraculous 
interference on God's part, and in the meantime, as it 
were, wallows in wretchedness. 

But although the terrible circumstances of the time 
certainly disengaged and developed many ideas of this 
kind, and easily account for the wild enterprises of the 
false Messiahs and the political efforts of fanatical 
Pharisees, they are very far from being sufficient to 
explain John the Baptist's message. They do, indeed, 
explain how it was that deliverance from earthly things 
was an idea which seized hold of wide circles, and that 



46 What is Christianity? 

people were looking to God. Trouble makes men pray. 
But trouble in itself does not give any moral force, and 
moral force was the chief element in John the Baptist's 
message. In appealing to it, in proclaiming that 
everything must be based on morality and personal 
responsibility, he took a higher point of view than the 
feeble piety of the " poor,'' and drew, not from time, but 
from eternity. 

It is scarcely a century since Fichte delivered his 
memorable orations here in Berlin, after the terrible 
defeat which Germany had suffered. What did he 
do in these lectures ? In the first place, he held up a 
mirror to the nation, and showed it its sins and their 
consequences — frivolity, godlessness, self-complacency, 
infatuation, weakness. What did he do next.^ Did 
he simply call them to arms? Arms were just what 
they were no longer capable of bearing ; they had been 
struck from their powerless hands. It was to repentance 
and to inward conversion that he called them ; ,to God, 
and therefore to the exertion of all their moral force ; 
to truth and to the Spirit, so that by the Spirit 
everything might be made new. By his powerful 
personality, and in union with friends of a like mind, 
he produced an immense impression. He succeeded 
in opening up once more the choked fountains of our 
energy, because he knew the strength from which help 
comes and had drunk of the living water himself No 
doubt the necessities of the time taught him and steeled 



John the Baptist 47 

him ; but it would be foolish and ridiculous to maintain 
that Fichte's orations were the product of the general 
woe. They were the antithesis of it. Not otherwise 
must we think of John the Baptist's message, and — let 
me say it at once — of the message which Jesus himself 
delivered. That they appealed to those who expected 
nothing of the world or of politics (of John the Baptist, 
however, this is not directly reported) ; that they would 
have nothing to do with those popular leaders who 
led the people to ruin ; that they turned their gaze 
altogether from earthly things, may also be accounted 
for by the circumstances of the time. But the remedy 
which they proclaimed was no product of those circum- 
stances. Nay, to invoke only the ordinary canons of 
morality and expect everything of them — was it not 
bound to seem a hopeless enterprise ? Whence came 
the power, the inflexible power, which compelled others ? 
This leads us to the last of the questions which we have 
raised. 

Thirdly, what was there that was new in the whole 
movement ? Was it anything new to set up the 
sovereignty of God, the sovereignty of the good and the 
holy, in opposition to all the other elements which had 
forced their way into religion ? Did John the Baptist, 
did Christ himself, come with any message that had not 
been proclaimed long before ? Gentlemen, the question 
as to what is new in religion is not a question which is 
raised by those who live in it. What is there that can 



48 What is Christianity? 

have been " new,'"* seeing that mankind existed so long 
before Jesus Christ and had witnessed so much in the 
way of inteUigence and knowledge ? Monotheism had 
long been introduced, and the few possible types of 
monotheistic religious fervour had long made their 
appearance here and there, and had taken possession of 
whole schools, nay, of a whole nation. Can the religious 
individualism of that Psalmist ever be surpassed in 
depth and vigour who confessed : " Lord, when I have 
thee, I ask not after heaven and earth '*' ? Can we go 
beyond what Micah said : " He hath showed thee, O 
man, what is good ; and what doth the Lord require of 
thee but to do justly and to love mercy, and to walk 
humbly with thy God "'"' ? Centuries had elapsed since 
these words were spoken. " What do you want, then, 
with your Christ?'" we are asked, chiefly by Jewish 
scholars ; " he introduced nothing new.'' I answer with 
Wellhausen : It is quite true that what Jesus pro- 
claimed, what John the Baptist expressed before him in 
his exhortations to repentance, was also to be found in 
the prophets, and even in the Jewish tradition of their 
time. The Pharisees themselves were in possession of 
it ; but unfortunately they were in possession of much 
else besides. With them it was weighted, darkened, 
distorted, rendered ineffective and deprived of its force, 
by a thousand things which they also took to be a part 
of religion just as important as mercy and judgment. 
They reduced everything to one dead level, wove every- 



John the Baptist 49 

thing into one fabric ; the good and holy was only one 
woof in a broad earthly warp. You ask again, then : 
" What was there that was new ? ^'' The question is out 
of place in monotheistic religion. Ask rather : " What 
was here proclaimed, had it any strength and was it 
pm-e ? ^*' I answer : Take the people of Israel and search 
the whole history of their religion, take history 
generally, and where will you find any message about 
God and the good that was ever so pure and so full of 
strength — for purity and strength go together — as we 
hear and read of in the Gospels ? As regards purity, 
the spring of holiness had, indeed, long been opened ; 
but it was choked with sand and dirt, and its water was 
polluted. That rabbis and theologians came in after- 
wards and tried to distil this water, even if successfully, 
made no difference. Now, however, the spring burst 
forth afresh, and broke a new way for itself through 
the rubbish — through the rubbish which priests and 
theologians had heaped up so as to smother the true 
element in religion ; for how often does it happen in 
history that theology is only the instrument for getting 
rid of religion ! As for the other element, that of 
strength, Pharisaical teachers had proclaimed that 
everything was contained in the injunction to love God 
and neighbour. They spoke excellently ; the words 
might have come out of Jesus^ mouth. But what was 
the result of their language ? That the nation, that 

in particular their own pupils, condemned the man who 

4 



50 What is Christianity? 

took the words seriously. All that they did was weak 
and, because weak, harmful. What produces the 
effect is not words ; it is the power of the personality 
that stands behind them. " He taught as one having 
authority and not as the Scribes'*** — such was the 
impression of him which his disciples received. His 
words became to them " the words of life,"' seeds which 
sprang up and bore fruit. That w^as what was new. 

Some such message John the Baptist had already 
begun to deliver. He, too, had undoubtedly placed 
himself in opposition to the leaders of the people ; for 
any man who tells people to " reform,"' and at the 
same time enjoins nothing more than repentance and 
good works, always comes into opposition with the 
official leaders of religion and church. But beyond the 
lines of the message of repentance did John not go. 

Jesus Christ then appeared. He first of all accepted 
and affirmed the Baptises message to its full extent, 
and he acknowledged the Baptist himself; nay, there 
was no one of whom he spoke in language of such warm 
recognition. Did not he say that among them that were 
born of women there had not arisen a greater than 
John the Baptist ? Again and again he acknowledged 
that his cause began with the Baptist and that the 
Baptist was his forerunner. Nay, he had had himself 
baptized by him, and had thereby put himself into the 
movement which the Baptist began. 

But he did not rest there. When he appeared, he, 



Jesus' Message 51 

too, it is true, like John proclaimed : " Repent, for the 
kingdom of God is at hand '' ; but his message became 
one of joy as he delivered it. The traditions about him 
contain nothing more certain than that his message was 
an " evangel," and that it was felt to bring blessing and 
joy. With good reason, therefore, the evangelist Luke 
began his narrative of Jesus' public appearance with the 
words of the prophet Isaiah : — " The Spirit of the Lord 
is upon me^ because he hath anointed me to preach the 
gospel to the poor ; he hath sent me to heal the broken- 
hea7ied^ to preach deliverance to the captives and recover- 
ing of sight to the blind^ to set at liberty them that are 
bruised^ to preach the acceptable year of the Lord^ Or 
in Jesus'* own words : — '' Come unto me^ all ye that labour 
and are heavy laden^ and I will give you rest. Take 
my yoke upon you^ and learn of me ; for I am meek and 
lowly of heart ; and ye shall find rest unto your soids. 
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.'' These 
words dominated Jesus' whole work and message ; they 
contain the theme of all that he taught and did. They 
make it at once obvious that in this teaching of his 
he left John the Baptist's message far behind. The 
latter, although already in silent conflict with the 
priests and the scribes, did not become a definite signal 
for contradiction. " The falling and the rising again,'" 
a new humanity opposed to the old, men of God — these 
Jesus Christ was the first to create. He came into 
immediate opposition with the official leaders of the 



52 What is Christianity? 

people, and in them with ordinary human nature in 
general. They thought of God as of a despot guarding 
the ceremonial observances in His household; he 
breathed in the presence of God. They saw Him only 
in His law, which they had converted into a labyrinth of 
dark defiles, blind alleys and secret passages ; he saw and 
felt Him everywhere. They were in possession of a 
thousand of His commandments, and thought, therefore, 
that they knew Him ; he had one only, and that was 
why he knew Him. They had made this religion into 
an earthly trade, and there was nothing more detestable ; 
he proclaimed the living God and the soul's nobility. 

If, however, we take a general view of Jesus' teach- 
ing, we shall see that it may be grouped under three 
heads. They are each of such a nature as to contain 
the whole, and hence it can be exhibited in its entirety 
under any one of them. 

Firstly^ the Mngdom of God and its coming. 

Secondly^ God the Father and the iiifinite value of the 
human soid. 

Thirdly,, the higher righteousness and the command- 
ment of love. 

That Jesus'* message is so great and so powerful lies 
in the fact that it is so simple and on the othei' hand so 
rich ; so simple as to be exhausted in each of the lead- 
ing thoughts which he uttered ; so rich that every one 
of these thoughts seems to be inexhaustible and the 
full meaning of the sayings and parables beyond our 



Jesus' Message 53 

reach. But more than that — he himself stands behind 
everything that he said. His words speak to us across 
the centuries with the freshness of the present. It is 
here that that profound saying is truly verified : 
" Speak, that I may see thee." 

Our course in what follows will be to try to learn 
what those three heads are, and to classify the thoughts 
which come under them. They contain the main 
features of Jesus' message. We shall then try to under- 
stand the Gospel in its relations to certain great 
questions of life. 

I. The hingdom of God and its coming. 

Jesus' message of the kingdom of God runs through 
all the forms and statements of the prophecy which, 
taking its colour from the Old Testament, announces 
the day of judgment and the visible government of 
God in the future, up to the idea of an inward coming 
of the kingdom, starting with Jesus' message and then 
beginning. His message embraces these two poles, 
with many stages between them that shade off one into 
another. At the one pole the coming of the kingdom 
seems to be a purely future event, and the kingdom 
itself to be the external rule of God ; at the other, it 
appears as something inward, something which is 
already present and making its entrance at the moment. 
You see, therefore, that neither the conception of the 



54 What is Christianity? 

kingdom of God, nor the way in which its coming is 
represented, is free from ambiguity. Jesus took it 
from the rehgious traditions of his nation, where it 
ah^eady occupied a foremost place ; he accepted various 
aspects of it in which the conception was still a living 
force, and he added new ones. Eudaemonistic expecta- 
tions of a mundane and political character were all that 
he discarded. 

Jesus, like all those of his own nation who were really 
in earnest, was profoundly conscious of the great anti- 
thesis between the kingdom of God and that kingdom 
of the world in which he saw the reign of evil and the 
evil one. This was no mere image or empty idea ; it 
was a truth which he saw and felt most vividly. He 
was certain, then, that the kingdom of the world must 
perish and be destroyed. But nothing short of a battle 
can effect it. With dramatic intensity battle and 
victory stand like a picture before his soul, drawn in 
those large firm lines in which the prophets had seen 
them. At the close of the drama he sees himself seated 
at the right hand of his Father, and his twelve disciples 
on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel ; so 
objective was this picture to him, so completely in 
harmony with the ideas of his time. Now we may take 
the view — and not a few of us take it — tliat in these 
dramatic pictures, with their hard colours and contrasts, 
we have the actual purport of Jesus' message and the 
fundamental form which it took ; and that all his 



The Kingdom of God 55 

other statements of it must be simply regarded as 
secondary. We may say that they are all variations of 
it more or less edifying, variations which were added, 
perhaps, only by later reporters ; but that the only 
positive factor is the dramatic hope for the future. In 
this view I cannot concur. It is considered a perverse 
proceeding in similar cases to judge eminent, epoch- 
making personalities first and foremost by what they 
share with their contemporaries, and on the other hand 
to put everything great and characteristic in them into 
the background. The tendency to reduce everything 
as far as possible to one level, and to efface what is 
special and individual, may spring in some minds 
from a praiseworthy sense of truth, but it has proved 
misleading. More frequently, however, we get the 
endeavour, conscious or unconscious, to refuse greatness 
any recognition at all, and to throw down anything 
that is exalted. There can be no doubt about the 
fact that the idea of the two kingdoms, of God and of 
the devil, and their conflicts, and of that last conflict at 
some future time when the devil, long cast out of 
heaven, will be also defeated on earth, was an idea 
which Jesus simply shared with his contemporaries. 
He did not start it, but he grew up in it and he re- 
tained it. The other view, however, that the kingdom 
of God " Cometh not with observation,"'* that it is 
already here, was his own. 

For us, gentlemen, to-day, it is difficult to reconcile, 



56 What is Christianity? 

nay, it is scarcely possible to bridge over, such an 
opposition as is involved, on the one side in a dramatic 
picture of God's kingdom existing in the future, and 
on the other in the announcement that " it is in the 
midst of you,"" a still and mighty power in the hearts 
of men. But to understand why it was that with other 
historical traditions and other forms of culture no 
opposition was felt to exist between these views, nay, 
that both were able to exist side by side, we must 
reflect, we must steep ourselves in the history of the 
past. I imagine that a few hundred years hence people 
will also discover in the intellectual ideas which we 
shall have left behind us much that is contradictory, 
and they will wonder how we put up with it. They 
will find much hard and dry husk in what we took for 
kernel ; they will be unable to understand how we could 
be so short-sighted, or have failed to get a sound 
grasp of what was essential and separate it from the 
rest. Some day the knife will be applied and pieces 
will be cut away where as yet we do not feel the 
slightest inclination to distinguish. Let us hope that 
we may then find fair judges, who will measure our 
ideas, not by what we have unwittingly taken over from 
tradition and are neither able nor called upon to correct, 
but by what was born of our very own, by the changes 
and improvements which we have effected in what was 
handed down to us or was commonly prevalent in 
our day, 



The Kingdom of God 57 

Truly the historian's task of distinguishing between 
what is traditional and what is peculiar, between kernel 
and husk, in Jesus'* message of the kingdom of God, is 
a difficult and responsible one. How far may we go ? 
We surely cannot want to rob this message of its innate 
quality and colour ; we cannot want to change it into 
a pale scheme of ethics. On the other hand, w^e cannot 
want to lose sight of its peculiar character and strength, 
as we should do were we to side with those who resolve 
it into the general ideas prevailing at the time. The 
very way in which Jesus distinguished between the 
traditional elements — he left out none in which there 
was a spark of moral force, and he accepted none which 
encouraged the selfish expectations of his nation — this 
very discrimination teaches us that it was from a 
deeper knowledge that he spoke and taught. But we 
possess testimonies of a much more striking kind. If 
anyone wants to know what the kingdom of God and 
the coming of it meant in Jesus' message, he must read 
and study his parables. He will then see what it is 
that is meant. The kingdom of God comes by coming 
to the individual, by entering into his soul and laying 
hold of it. True, the kingdom of God is the rule of 
God ; but it is the rule of the holy God in the hearts 
of individuals ; it is God himself in his power. From 
this point of view everything that was dramatic in the 
external and historical sense has vanished ; and gone, 
too, are all the external hopes for the future. Take \ 



58 What is Christianity? 

whatever parable you will, the parable of the sower, 
of the pearl of great price, of the treasure buried in 
the field — the word of God, God himself, is the king- 
dom. It is not a question of angels and devils, thrones 
and principalities, but of God and the soul, the soul 
and its God. 



LECTURE IV. 

We last spoke of Jesus' message in so far as it pro- 
claimed the kingdom of God and its coming. We saw 
that it runs through all the forms in which the prophecy 
of the day of judgment is expressed in the Old Testa- 
ment, up to the idea of an inward coming of the 
kingdom then beginning. Finally we tried to show 
why the latter idea is to be regarded as the dominant 
one. Before examining it more closely, however, I 
should like to draw your attention to two particularly 
important expressions of it, lying between the extremes 
of the "day of judgment'*' and the "inner coming.'' 

In the first of them, the coming of God's kingdom 
means the destruction of the devil's, and victory over 
the demons. Hitherto it is they who have been ruling ; 
having taken possession of men and even of whole 
nations, they are forcing them to their will. Jesus not 
only declares that he is come to destroy the works of 
the devil, but he actually drives out the demons and 
releases men from their power. 

Let me here digress a little from our subject. Noth- 
ing in the Gospels strikes us as stranger than the 

69 



6o What is Christianity? 

frequently recurring stories of demons, and the great 
importance which the evangehsts attach to them. For 
many among us the very fact that these writings report 
such absurdities is sufficient reason for decHning to 
accept them. Now in this connexion it is well to 
know that absolutely similar stories are to be found 
in numerous writings of that age, Greek, Roman, and 
Jewish. The notion of people being " possessed '" was 
current everywhere ; nay, even the science of the time 
looked upon a whole section of morbid phenomena in 
this light. But the consequence of these phenomena 
being explained as meaning that some evil and invisible 
power had taken possession of a man, was that mental 
affections took forms which looked as if an alien being 
had really entered into the soul. There is nothing 
paradoxical in this. If modern science were to declare 
nervous disease to consist, in great part, of " possession,"*" 
and the newspapers were to spread this announcement 
amongst the public, the same thing would recur. We 
should soon have numerous cases in which nervous 
patients looked as if they were in the grip of an evil 
spirit, and themselves believed that they were so. 
Theory and belief would work by suggestion and again 
create a class of " demoniacs *" amongst the insane, just 
as they created them hundreds, nay thousands, of years 
ago. It is unhistorical and foolish to attribute any 
peculiar notion or " theory ""* about demons and the 
demoniac to the Gospels and the evangelists. They 



The Kingdom of God 6i 

only shared the general notions of their time. The 
forms of mental disease in question are of rare occurrence 
nowadays, but nevertheless they are not yet quite 
extinct. Where they occur the best means of encounter- 
ing them is to-day, as it was formerly, the influence of 
a strong personality. It is able to threaten and subdue 
the "devil,"*' and so heal the patient. In Palestine 
"demoniacs'" must have been particularly numerous. 
Jesus saw in them the forces of evil and mischief, and 
by his marvellous power over the souls of those who 
trusted him he banished the disease. This brings us 
to the second point. 

When John the Baptist in prison was disturbed by 
doubts as to whether Jesus was " he who was to come,*" 
he sent two of his own disciples to him to ask him 
himself. There is nothing more touching than this 
question of the Baptist's, nothing more edifying than 
the Lord's answer. But let us not dwell upon the 
scene itself. What was the answer ? " Go and shew 
John again those things which you do hear and see : 
the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the 
lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are 
raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached to 
them." That is what the "coming of the kingdom" 
means, or, rather, it is there already in this saving 
activity. By vanquishing and banishing misery, need 
and disease, by the actual influence which Jesus was 
exerting, John was to see that a new day had dawned. 



62 What is Christianity? 

The healing of the possessed was only a part of this 
saving activity ; the activity itself^ however^ zoas what 
Jesus denoted as the meaning and the seal of his mission. 
It was, then, to the wretched, to the sick, and to the 
poor, that he addressed himself; but not as a moralist 
and without any trace of weak-minded sentimentality. 
He makes no division of evils into departments and 
groups ; he spends no time in asking whether the sick 
one " deserves **" to be healed ; he is far, too, from 
being sympathetical about pain and death. He nowhere 
says that disease is salutary and that evil is a blessing. 
No ! disease he calls disease, and health he calls health. 
To him all evil, all misery, is something terrible ; it 
is part of the great realm of Satan ; yet he feels the 
power of the Saviour within him, and he knows that 
progress is possible only by overcoming weakness and 
healing disease. 

But this is not all. It is by his healing, above 
all by his forgiving sin, that the kingdom of God 
comes. Here we have the first complete transition 
to the conception of the kingdom of God as the 
power that works inwardly. As he calls the sick and 
the poor to him, so he calls sinners also, and it is this call 
which is all-important. " The Son of Man is come to 
seek and to save that which was lost.''*' Here for the 
first time everything that is external and merely future 
is abandoned : it is the individual, not the nation or 
the state, which is redeemed ; it is new men who are to 



The Kingdom of God 63 

arise, and the kingdom of God is to be at once their 
strength and the goal at which they aim. They search 
for the treasure hidden in the field and find it ; they 
sell all that they have and buy the pearl of great price ; 
they are converted and become as children ; but thereby 
they are redeemed and made God's children and God'^s 
champions. 

It was in this connexion that Jesus spoke of the 
kingdom of God which the violent take by force ; and, 
again, of the kingdom of God which grows steadily and 
silently like a seed and bears fruit. It is in its very 
nature a spiritual force, a power which sinks into a man 
within, and can be understood only from within. Thus, 
although the kingdom is also in heaven ; although it 
will come with the day of judgment, he can still say 
of it : " It is not here or there, it is within you." 

At a later period the view of the kingdom, according 
to which it was already come and still comes in Jesus'* 
saving activity, was not kept up by his disciples : nay, 
they continued to speak of it as of something that was 
solely in the future. But the thing itself retained its 
force ; it was only given another title. It underwent 
the same experience as the conception of the " Messiah.'''' 
As we shall see hereafter, there was scarcely anyone in 
the Church of the Gentiles who sought to explain 
Jesus' significance by regarding him as the " Messiah.'''' 
But the thing itself did not perish. 

The essential elements in the message of the kingdom 



64 What is Christianity? 

were preserved. The kingdom has a triple meaning. 
Firstly, it is something supernatural, a gift from above, 
not a product of ordinary life. Secondly, it is a purely 
religious blessing, the inner link with the living God ; 
thirdly, it is the most important experience that a man 
can have, that on which everything else depends ; it 
permeates and dominates his whole existence, because 
sin is forgiven and misery banished. 

Without this kingdom, which comes to the humble 
and makes them new men and joyful, the meaning and 
the aim of life would not be laid bare. This was what 
Jesus himself found, and what his disciples found. It 
is by the supernatural element alone that we can ever 
get at the meaning of life ; for natural existence ends 
in death, and a life that is bound up with death 
can have no meaning. This is a fact to which 
only sophisms can blind us. Here, however, the 
kingdom of God, the Eternal, entered into time. 
" Eternal light came in and made the world look new.""' 
This is Jesus' message of the kingdom. Everything 
else that he proclaimed can be brought into connexion 
with this ; his whole " doctrine "*' can be conceived as a 
message of the kingdom. But we shall recognise this, 
and the blessing which he means, still more clearly, if 
we turn to the second of the sections indicated in the 
previous lecture, and thereby progressively acquaint 
ourselves with the fundamental features of Jesus' 
message. 



God the Father 65 

II. God the Father and the infinite value of the 
human soul. 

To our modern way of thinking and feeling, Christ's 
message appears in the clearest and most direct light 
when grasped in connexion with the idea of God the 
Father and the infinite value of the human soul. Here 
the elements which I would describe as the restful and 
rest-giving in Jesus'* message, and which are compre- 
hended in the idea of our being children of God, find 
expression. I call them restful in contrast with the 
impulsive and stirring elements ; although it is just 
they that are informed with a special strength. But 
the fact that the whole of Jesus'* message may be reduced 
to these two heads — God as the Father, and the human 
soul so ennobled that it can and does unite with Him — 
shows us that the Gospel is in no wise a positive religion 
like the rest ; that it contains no statutory or particular- 
istic elements ; that it is^ therefore^ religion itself It 
is superior to all antithesis and tension between this 
world and a world to come, between reason and ecstasy, 
between work in the world and holding aloof from it, 
between Judaism and Hellenism. It can dominate them 
all, and to no sphere of earthly life is it confined or 
necessarily tied down. Let us, however, get a clearer 
idea of what being children of God, in Jesus' sense, 
means, by briefly considering four groups of sayings, or, 

as the case may be, single sayings of his, viz. : — (1) The 

5 



66 What is Christianity? 

Lord's Prayer; (2) that utterance, "Rejoice not that 
the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice 
because your names are written in heaven " ; (3) the 
words " Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing ? and 
one of them shall not fall on the ground without your 
Father. But the very hairs of your head are all 
numbered '"* ; and lastly (4), " What shall it profit a 
man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his 
own soul ? "''* 

Let us take the Lord's Prayer first. It was com- 
municated by Jesus to his disciples at a particularly 
solemn moment. They had asked him to teach them 
how to pray, as John the Baptist had taught his 
disciples. Thereupon he uttered the Lord's Prayer. 
It is by their prayers that the character of all higher 
religions is determined. This prayer, however, is 
spoken — as every one must feel who has ever given it a 
thought in his soul — by one who has overcome all inner 
unrest, or overcomes it the moment that he goes before 
God. The very apostrophe of the prayer, " Our 
Father," exhibits the steady faith of the man who knows 
that he is safe in God, and it tells us that he is certain 
of being heard. Not to hurl violent desires at heaven 
or to obtain this or that earthly blessing does he pray, 
but to preserve the power which he already possesses and 
strengthen the union with God in which he lives. No 
one, then, can utter this prayer unless his heart is in 
profound peace and his mind wholly concentrated on 



God the Father 67 

the inner relation of the soul with God. All other 
prayers are of a lower order, for they go into particulars 
or are so framed that in some way or other they stir the 
imagination in regard to the things of sense as well ; 
whilst this prayer leads us away from everything to 
the height where the soul is alone with its God. And 
yet the earthly element is not absent. The whole 
of the second half of the prayer deals with earthly 
relations, but they are placed in the light of the Eternal. 
In vain will you look for any request for particular 
gifts of grace, or special blessings, even of a spiritual 
kind. "" All else shall be added unto you."" The name 
of God, His will, and His kingdom — these elements of 
rest and permanence are diffused over the earthly 
relations as well. Everything that is small and selfish 
melts away, and only four things are left with regard to 
which it is worth while to pray — the daily bread, the 
daily trespass, the daily temptations, and the evil in life. 
There is nothing in the Gospels that tells us more 
certainly what the Gospel is, and what sort of disposition 
and temper it produces, than the Lord's Prayer. With 
this prayer all those who disparage the Gospel by 
representing it as an ascetic or ecstatic or sociological 
pronouncement ought to be confronted. It shows the 
Gospel to be the Fatherhood of God applied to the 
whole of life ; to be an inner union with God's will and 
God's kingdom, and a joyous certainty of the possession 
of eternal blessings and protection from evil. 



68 What is Christianity? 

As to the second utterance : when Jesus says " Rejoice 
not that the spirits are subject unto you, but rejoice 
rather that your names are written in heaven,'*'' it is 
another way of laying special emphasis on the idea that 
the all-important element in this religion is the con- 
sciousness of being safe in God. The greatest achieve- 
ments, nay, the very works which are done in the strength 
of this religion, fall below the assurance, at once humble 
and proud, of resting for time and eternity under 
the fatherly care of God. Moreover, the genuineness, 
nay, the actual existence, of religious experience is to be 
measured, not by any transcendency of feeling or by 
great deeds that all men can see, but by the joy and the 
peace which are diffused through the soul that can say 
" My Father.^' 

How far did Christ carry this idea of the fatherly 
providence of God ? Here we come to the third saying : 
" Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing ; and one of 
them shall not fall to the ground without your Father. 
But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.**" 
The assurance that God rules is to go as far as our 
fears go, nay, as far as life itself — life down even to its 
smallest manifestations in the order of Nature. It was 
to disabuse his disciples of the fear of evil and the 
terrors of death that he gave them the sayings about 
the sparrows and the flowers of the field ; they are to 
learn how to see the hand of the living God everywhere 
in life, and in death too. 



God the Father 69 

Finally, in asking — and after what has gone before 
the question can hardly surprise us — " What shall it 
profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose 
his own soul ? '^ he put a man's value as high as it can 
be put. The man who can say " My Father '" to the 
Being who rules heaven and earth is thereby raised 
above heaven and earth, and himself has a value which 
is higher than all the fabric of this world. But this 
great saying took the stern tone of a warning. He 
offered them a gift and with it set them a task. How 
different was the Greek doctrine ! Plato, it is true, had 
already sung the great hymn of the mind ; he had 
distinguished it from the whole world of appearance 
and maintained its eternal origin. But the mind 
which he meant was the knowing mind ; he contrasted 
it with blind, insensible matter ; his message made its 
appeal to the wise. Jesus Christ calls to every poor 
soul ; he calls to every one who bears a human face : 
You are children of the living God, and not only 
better than many sparrows but of more value than the 
whole world. The value of a truly great man, as 1 saw 
it put lately, consists in his increasing the value of all 
mankind. There is, indeed, nothing more significant 
in great men than this, that they have enhanced, that 
is, have progressively given effect to, human value, to 
the value of that race of men which has risen up out of 
the dull ground of Nature. But Jesus Christ was the 
first to bring the value of every human soul to light, 



70 What is Christianity? 

and what he did no one can any more undo. We may 
take up what relation to him we will ; in the history 
of the past no one can refuse to recognise that it was 
he who raised humanity to this level. 

This highest estimate of a man"*s value is based on a 
transvaluation of all values. To the man who boasts 
of his possessions he says : '' Thou fool.'*'' He confronts 
every one with the thought : " Whosoever will lose his 
life shall save it.^"* He can even say : " He that 
hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life 
eternal.'^ This is the transvaluation of values of which 
many before him had a dim idea ; of which they per- 
ceived the truth as through a veil ; the redeeming 
power of which — that blessed mystery — they felt in 
advance. He was the first to give it calm, simple, and 
fearless expression, as though it were a truth which 
grew on every tree. It was just this that stamped his 
peculiar genius, that he gave perfectly simple expression 
to profound and all-important truths, as though they 
could not be otherwise ; as though he were uttering 
something that was self-evident ; as though he wei'e 
only reminding men of what they all know already, 
because it lives in the innermost part of their souls. 

In the combination of these ideas — God the Father, 
Providence, the position of men as God's children, the 
infinite value of the human soul — the whole Gospel is 
expressed. But we must recognise what a paradox it 
all is ; nay, that the paradox of religion here for the 



God the Father 71 

first time finds its full expression. Measured by the 
experience of the senses and by exact knowledge, not 
only are the different religions a paradox, but so are all 
religious phenomena. They introduce an element, and 
pronounce it to be the most important of all, which is 
not cognisable by the senses, and flies in the face of 
things as they are actually constituted. All religions, 
however, other than Christianity are in some way so 
bound up with the things of the world that they involve 
an element of earthly advantage, or, as the case may 
be, are akin in their substance to the intellectual and 
spiritual condition of a definite epoch. But what can 
be less obvious than the statement : the hairs of your 
head are all numbered ; you have a supernatural value ; 
you can put yourselves into the hands of a power which 
no one has seen ? Either that is nonsense, or else 
it is the utmost development of w^hich religion is 
capable ; no longer a mere phenomenon accompanying 
the life of the senses, a co-efRcient, a transfiguration of 
certain parts of that life, but something which sets up 
a paramount title to be the first and the only fact 
that reveals the fundamental basis and meaning of life. 
Religion subordinates to itself the whole motley world 
of phenomena, and defies that world if it claims to 
be the only real one. Religion offers us only a single 
experience, but one which presents the world in a new 
light : the Eternal appears ; time becomes means to an 
end ; man is in his place on the side of the Eternal, 



72 What is Christianity? 

This was certainly Jesus^ meaning, and to take any- 
thing from it is to destroy it. In applying the idea of 
Providence to the whole of humanity and the world 
without any exception ; in showing that humanity is 
rooted in the Eternal ; in proclaiming the fact that we 
are God'^s children as at once a gift and a task, he took 
a vigorous hold of all fumbling and stammering 
attempts at religion and brought them to their issue. 
Once more let it be said : we may assume what position 
we will in regard to him and his message, certain it is 
that thence onward the value of our race is enhanced ; 
human lives, nay, we ourselves, have become dearer to 
one another. A man may know it or not, but a real 
reverence for humanity follows from the practical 
recognition of God as the Father of us all. 

III. The higher righteousness and the commandment 

of love. 

This is the third head, and the whole of the Gospel 
is embraced under it. To represent the Gospel as an 
ethical message is no depreciation of its value. The 
ethical system which Jesus found prevailing in his 
nation was both ample and profound. To judge the 
moral ideas of the Pharisees solely by their childish and 
casuistical aspects is wrong. By being bound up with 
religious worship and petrified in ritual observance, the 
morality of holiness had, indeed, been transformed into 



The Higher Righteousness 73 

something that was the clear opposite of it. But all 
was not yet hard and dead; there was some life still 
left in the deeper parts of the system. To those who 
questioned him Jesus could still answer : " You have 
the law, keep it ; you know best yourselves what you 
have to do ; the sum of the law is, as you yourselves 
say, to love God and your neighbour." Nevertheless, 
there is a sphere of ethical thought which is peculiarly 
expressive of Jesus'* Gospel. Let us make this clear by 
citing four points. 

Firstly : Jesus severed the connexion existing in his 
day between ethics and the external forms of religious 
worship and technical observance. He would have 
absolutely nothing to do with the purposeful and self- 
seeking pursuit of " good works "*^ in combination with 
the ritual of worship. He exhibited an indignant 
contempt for men who allow their neighbours, nay, 
even their parents, to starve, and on the other hand 
send gifts to the temple. He will have no compromise 
in the matter. Love and mercy are ends in themselves ; 
they lose all value and are put to shame by having to 
be anything else than the service of one's neighbour. 

Secondly : in all questions of morality he goes 
straight to the root, that is, to the disposition and the 
intention. It is only thus that what he calls the 
" higher righteousness '"' can be understood. The 
"higher righteousness"" is the righteousness that will 
stand when the depths of the heart are probed. Here, 



74 What is Christianity? 

again, we have something that is seemingly very simple 
and self-evident. Yet the truth, as he uttered it, took 
the severe form : " It was said of old . . . but I say 
unto you.'*'' After all, then, the truth was something 
new ; he was aware that it had never yet been expressed 
in such a consistent form and with such claims to 
supremacy. A large portion of the so-called Sermon 
on the Mount is occupied with what he says when he 
goes in detail through the several departments of 
human relationships and human failings so as to bring 
the disposition and intention to light in each case, to 
judge a man''s works by them, and make heaven and 
hell depend on them. 

Thirdly : what he freed from its connexion with 
self-seeking and ritual elements, and recognised as the 
moral principle, he reduces to one root and to one 
motive — love. He knows of no other, and love itself, 
whether it takes the form of love of one's neighbour or 
of one's enemy, or the love of the Samaritan, is of one 
kind only. It must completely fill the soul ; it is what 
remains when the soul dies to itself In this sense love 
is the new life already begun. But it is always the love 
which serves^ and only in this function does it exist 
and live. 

Fourthly : we saw that Jesus freed the moral element 
from all alien connexions, even from its alliance with 
the public religion. When people say that the Gospel 
is a matter of ordinary morality, this is not to mis- 



The Higher Righteousness 75 

understand him. And yet there is one all-important 
point where he combines religion and morality. It is 
a point which must be felt ; it is not easy to define. In 
view of the Beatitudes it may, perhaps, best be 
described as humility, Jesus made love and humility 
one. Humility is not a virtue by itself; it is a purely 
receptive attitude, the expression of inner need, the 
prayer for God's grace and forgiveness ; in a word, the 
opening up of the heart to God. In Jesus'* view, this 
humility, which is the love of God of which we are 
capable — take, for instance, the parable of the Pharisee 
and the publican — is an abiding disposition towards the 
good ; it is that out of which everything that is good 
springs and grows. " Forgive us our trespasses even as 
we forgive them that trespass against us *" is the prayer 
at once of humility and of love. This, then, is the 
source and origin of the love of one's neighbour ; the 
poor in spirit and those who hunger and thirst after 
righteousness are also the peacemakers and the merciful. 

It was in this sense that Jesus combined religion and 
morality, and in this sense religion may be called the 
soul of morality, and morality the body of religion. 
We can thus understand how it was that Jesus could 
place the love of God and the love of one's neighbour 
side by side ; the love of one's neighbour is the only 
practical proof on earth of that love of God which finds 
its life in humility. 

In thus expressing his message of the higher right- 



76 What is Christianity? 

eousness and the new commandment of love in these 
four leading thoughts, Jesus defined the sphere of the 
ethical in a way in which no one before him had ever 
defined it. But if ever we are threatened with doubts 
as to what he meant, we must steep ourselves again and 
again in the Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount. 
They contain his ethics and his religion, united at 
the root, and freed from all external and particular- 
istic elements. 



LECTURE V. 

At the close of the last lecture I referred to the Beati- 
tudes, and mentioned that they exhibit Jesus'* religion 
in a particularly impressive way. I desire to remind 
you of another passage which shows that Jesus recog- 
nised the practical proof of religion to consist in the 
exercise of neighbourly love and mercy. In one of his 
last discom-ses he spoke of the Judgment, bringing it 
before his hearers' eyes in the parable of the shepherd 
separating the sheep from the goats. The sole principle 
of separation is the question of mercy. The question 
is raised by asking whether men gave food and drink to 
Jesus himself, and visited him ; that is to say, it is, put 
as a religious question. The paradox is then resolved 
in the sentence : " Inasmuch as ye have done it unto 
one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it 
unto me." We can have no clearer illustration of the 
fact that in Jesus'* view mercy was the quality on which 
everything turned, and that the temper in which it is 
exercised is the guarantee that a man's religious position 
is the right one. How so ? Because in exercising this 

virtue men are imitating God : " Be merciful, even as 

77 



78 What is Christianity? 

your Father in heaven is merciful.'*'' He who exercises 
mercy exercises God's prerogative ; for God'^s justice is 
not accomplished by keeping to the rule, " an eye for 
an eye and a tooth for a tooth,"' but is subject to the 
power of His mercy. 

Let us pause here for a moment. The history of 
religion marked an enormous advance, religion itself 
was established afresh, when through poets and thinkers 
in Greece on the one hand, and through the prophets 
in Palestine on the other, the idea of righteousness and 
a righteous God became a living force and transformed 
tradition. The gods were raised to a higher level and 
civilised ; the warlike and capricious Jehovah became a 
holy Being in whose court of judgment a man might 
trust, albeit in fear and trembling. The two great 
provinces of religion and morality, hitherto separated, 
were now brought into close relation ; for " the God- 
head is holy and just."*" It is our history that was then 
developed; for without that all-important transforma- 
tion there would be no such thing as " mankind,"*'' no 
such thing as a " history of the world **' in the higher 
sense. The most immediate result of this development 
may be summed up in the maxim : " What ye would 
not that men should do unto you, do ye also not unto 
them.**** Insufficient and prosaic as the rule may seem, 
yet, if extended so as to cover all human relationships 
and really observed, it contains a civilising force of 
enormous strength. 



The Higher Righteousness 79 

But it does not contain the ultimate step. Not 
until justice was compelled to give way to mercy, and 
the idea of brotherhood and self-sacrifice in the service 
of one's neighbour became paramount, was the last ad- 
vance accomplished that it was possible and necessary to 
make. Here, again, religion received a fresh foundation. 
Its maxim, " What ye would that men should do unto 
you, do ye also unto them,"" may also seem prosaic ; 
and yet rightly understood it leads to the summit 
I* and comprises a new method of apprehension, and a 
j new way of judging one''s own life. The thought 
I that " he who loses his life he shall save it,*" runs 
side by side with this maxim and effects a transvalua- 
i tion of values in the certainty that a man's true life 
is not tied to this span of time and is not rooted in 
material existence. 

I hope that I have thus shown, however briefly, that 
in the sphere of thought which is indicated by " the 
higher righteousness ""^ and " the new commandment of 
love " Jesus' teaching is also contained in its entirety. 
As a matter of fact, the three spheres which we have 
distinguished — the kingdom of God, God as the Father ! 
and the infinite value of the human soul, and the higher 
righteousness showing itself in love — coalesce ; for 
ultimately the kingdom is nothing but the treasure 
which the soul possesses in the eternal and merciful 
God. Taking Jesus' sayings as its groundwork, it needs 
only a very little trouble to develop this thought into 



I 



8o What is Christianity? 

everything that Christendom has known and strives to 
maintain as hope, faith, and love. 

To proceed : Now that we have established the 
fundamental characteristics of Jesus' message, let us 
try, in the second place, to treat of the main bearings of 
the Gospel as applied to individual problems. There 
are six points or questions which call for special atten- 
tion, as being the most important in themselves, and 
consequently felt and regarded as such in all ages. And 
although, in the course of the Church's history, one or 
other of these questions may have passed into the back- 
ground for a decade or two, it has always reappeared 
afresh, and with redoubled force : — 

(1) The Gospel and the world, or the question of 
asceticism ; 

(2) The Gospel and the poor, or the social question ; 

(3) The Gospel and law, or the question of public 
order ; 

(4) The Gospel and work, or the question of 
civilisation ; 

(5) The Gospel and the Son of God, or the Christo- 
logical question ; 

(6) The Gospel and doctrine, or the question of creed. 
By these six questions — the first four hang together, 

and the last two stand by themselves — I hope to be able 
to exhibit, of course only in outline, the most important 
bearings of Jesus'* message. 



Asceticism 8i 

(1) The Gospel and the tvorld^ or the question of 
asceticism. 

There is a widespread opinion — it is dominant in 
the Cathohc churches, and many Protestants share it 
nowadays — that, in the last resort and in the most 
important things which it enjoins, the Gospel is a 
strictly world-shunning and ascetic creed. Some people 
proclaim this piece of intelligence with sympathy and 
admiration ; nay, they magnify it into the contention 
that the whole value and meaning of genuine Chris- 
tianity, as of Buddhism, lies in its world-denying 
character. Others emphasise the world-shunning doc- 
trines of the Gospel in order thereby to expose its 
incompatibility with modern ethical principles, and to 
prove its uselessness as a religion. The Catholic 
churches have found a curious way out of the difficulty, 
and one which is, in reality, a product of despair. 
They recognise, as I have said, the world-denying 
character of the Gospel, and they teach, accordingly, 
that it is only in the form of monasticism — that is, in 
the " vita religiosa '"^ — that true Christian life finds its 
expression. But they admit a " lower '** kind of Chris- 
tianity without asceticism, as " sufficient.*" We will say 
nothing about this strange concession now; the Catholic 
doctrine is that it is only monks who can follow Christ 
fiilly. With this doctrine a great philosopher, and a 
still greater writer, of the nineteenth century, has 






82 What is Christianity? 

made common cause. Schopenhauer extols Christianity 
because, and in so far as, it has produced great ascetics 
like St. Anthony or St. Francis ; but, beyond that, 
everything in the Christian message seems to him to be 
useless and a stumbling-block. With a much deeper 
insight than Schopenhauer, and with a strength of 
feeling and power of language that carry us away, 
Tolstoi has emphasised the ascetic and world-shunning 
features of the Gospel, and erected them into a rule 
of observance. That the ascetic ideal which he derives 
from the Gospel is endowed with warmth and strength, 
and includes the service of one^s neighbour, is a fact 
which we cannot deny ; but to him, too, the shunning 
of the world is the leading characteristic of Christianity. 
There are thousands of our " educated *" readers who 
find his stories suggestive and exciting, but who at the 
bottom of their hearts are pleased and relieved to know 
that Christianity means the denial of the world ; for 
then they know very well that it does not concern them. 
They are certain, and rightly certain, that this world is 
given them to be made the best of, within the bounds 
of its own blessings and its own regulations ; and that 
if Christianity makes any other claim, it thereby shows 
that it is unnatural. If Christianity has no goal to set 
before this life ; if it transfers everything to a Beyond ; 
if it declares all earthly blessings to be valueless, and 
points exclusively to a world-shunning and contemplative 
life, it is an offence to all energetic, nay, ultimately, to 



Asceticism 83 

all true natures ; for such natures are certain that 
our faculties are given us to be employed, and that 
the earth is assigned to us to be cultivated and 
subdued. 

But is not the Gospel really a world-denying creed ? 
Certain very well known passages are appealed to which 
do not seem to admit of any other interpretation : "" If 
thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out and cast it 
from thee '''' ; " If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off '" ; 
or the answer to the rich young man : " Go sell what 
thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have 
treasure in heaven ^'' ; or the saying about those who 
have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of 
heaven'^s sake ; or the utterance : " If any man come to 
me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and 
children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life 
also, he cannot be my disciple." These and other 
passages seem to settle the matter, and to prove that 
the Gospel is altogether world-shunning and ascetic in 
its character. But to this thesis I oppose three con- 
siderations which point in another direction. The first 
is derived from the way in which Jesus came forward 
and from his manner and course of life ; the second is 
based upon the impression which he made upon his 
desciples and was reflected in their own lives ; the third 
springs from what we said about the fundamental 
features of Jesus'* message. 

1. We find in our Gospels a remarkable utterance 



84 What is Christianity? 

by Jesus, as follows : " John came neither eating nor 
drinking, and they say, He hath a devil. The Son of 
man came eating and drinking, and they say. Behold a 
man gluttonous and a wine-bibber. ""* A glutton, then, 
and a wine-bibber was he called in addition to the 
other abusive names which were given him. From this 
it clearly follows that in his whole demeanour and 
manner of life he made an impression quite different 
from that of the preacher of repentance on the banks 
of the Jordan. Towards the various fields in which 
asceticism had been traditionally practised he must have 
taken up an attitude of indifference. We see him in the 
houses of the rich and of the poor, at meals, with 
women and amongst children ; according to tradition, 
even at a wedding. He allows his feet to be washed 
and his head to be anointed. Further, he is glad to 
lodge with Mary and Martha ; he does not ask them to 
leave their home. When he finds to his joy people with 
a firm faith, he leaves them in the calling and the 
position in which they were. We do not hear of his 
telling them to sell all and follow him. Apparently he 
thinks it possible, nay, fitting that they should live 
unto their belief in the position in which God has 
placed them. His circle of disciples is not exhausted 
by the few whom he summoned directly to follow him. 
He finds God's children everywhere ; to discover them 
in their obscurity and to be allowed to speak to them 
some word of strength is his highest pleasure. But he 



Asceticism 85 

did not organise his disciples into a band of monks, and 
he gave them no directions as to what they were to do 
and leave undone in the life of the day. No one who 
reads the Gospels with an unprejudiced mind, and does 
not pick his words, can fail to acknowledge that this free 
and active spirit does not appear to be bent under the 
yoke of asceticism, and that such words, therefore, as 
point in this direction must be taken "in a rigid sense 
and generalised, but must not be regarded in a wider 
connexion and from a higher point of view. 

2. It is certain that the disciples did not understand 
their master to be a world-shunning ascetic. We 
shall see later what sacrifices they made for the 
Gospel, and in what sense they renounced the world. 
But it is evident they did not give ascetic practices 
the chief place ; they maintained the rule that the 
labourer is worthy of his hire ; they did not send away 
their wives. We are incidentally told of Peter that 
his wife accompanied him on his missionary journeys. 
Apart from what we are told of an attempt to institute 
a kind of communism in the congregation at Jerusalem 
— and we may put it aside, as it is not trustworthy 
and, moreover, bore no ascetic character — we find 
nothing in the apostolic age which suggests a community 
of men who were ascetics on principle ; on the contrary, 
we find the conviction prevailing elsewhere that it is 
within the given circumstances, in the calling and 
position in which he finds himself, that a man is to 



86 What is Christianity? 

be a Christian. How differently things developed in 
Buddhism from the very start ! 

3. The all-important consideration is the third. 
Let me remind you of what we said in regard to Jesus'* 
leading thoughts. In the sphere indicated by trust in 
God, humility, the forgiveness of sins and the love of 
one''s neighbour, there is no room for the introduction 
of any other maxim, least of all for one of a legal 
character. At the same time Jesus makes it clear in 
what sense the kingdom of God is the antithesis of the 
world. The man who associates any ascetic practice 
with the words '' Take no thought,""* " Be merciful, even 
as your Father in heaven is merciful,"'* and so on, and 
puts it upon the same level as those words, does not 
understand the sublime character of these sayings, and 
has either lost or has never attained the feeling that 
there is a union with God in which all such questions 
as shunning the world and asceticism are left far 
behind. 

For these reasons we must decline to regard the 
Gospel as a message of world-denial. 

On the other hand, Jesus speaks of three enemies, 
and the watchword which he gives in dealing with 
them is not that we are to flee them ; rather he com- 
mands us to annihilate them. These three enemies 
are mammon, care, and selfishness. Observe that 
here there is no question of flight or denial, but of 
a battle which is to be fought until the enemy is 



Asceticism 87 

annihilated ; the forces of darkness are to be overthrown. 
By mammon he understands money and worldly goods 
in the widest sense of the word — worldly goods which 
try to gain the mastery over us, and make us tyrants 
over others ; for money is " compressed force."" Jesus 
speaks of this enemy as if it were a person, as if it 
were a knight in armour, or a king ; nay, as if it were 
the devil himself. It is at this enemy that the saying 
"Ye cannot serve two masters'''* is aimed. Wherever 
anything belonging to the domain of mammon is of 
such value to a man that he sets his heart upon it, 
that he trembles at the thought of losing it, that he is 
no longer willing to give it up, such a man is already 
in bondage. Hence, when the Christian feels that 
this danger confronts him, he is not to treat with the 
enemy, but to fight, and not fight only but also destroy 
the mammon. Were Christ to preach among us to-day 
he would certainly not talk in general terms, and say 
to everyone, " give away everything you have " ; but 
there are thousands among us to whom he would so 
speak, and that there is scarcely anyone who feels 
compelled to apply these sayings of the Gospel to 
himself is a fact that ought to make us suspicious. 

The second enemy is care. At first sight it may 
surprise us that Jesus should describe care as so 
terrible a foe. He ranks it with " heathenism.'*'' It is 
true that in the Lord"'s Prayer he also taught men to 
pray, " Give us this day our daily bread '''' ; but a con- 



88 What is Christianity? 

fident request of this kind he does not call care. The 
care which he means is that which makes us timorous 
slaves of the day and of material things ; the care 
through which bit by bit we fall a prey to the world. 
Care is to him an outrage on God, who preserves 
the very sparrows on the housetop ; it destroys the 
fundamental relation with the Father in heaven, the 
childlike trust, and thus ruins our inmost soul. This 
is also a point in regard to which, as in respect to 
mammon, we must confess that we do not feel deeply 
and strongly enough to recognise the full truth of 
Jesus' message. But the question is, Who is right — 
he with the inexorable "Take no thought,'' or we 
with our debilitating fears ? We, too, in a measure 
feel that a man is not really free, strong, and invincible, 
until he has put aside all his cares and cast them upon 
God. How much we could accomplish and how strong 
we should be, if we did not fret. 

And then, thirdly : selfishness. It is self-denial, 
not asceticism, which Jesus requires ; self-denial to the 
point of self-renunciation. " If thy right eye offend 
thee, pluck it out ; if thy right hand ott'end thee, cut it 
oft*." Wherever some desire of the senses gains the 
upper hand of you, so that you become coarse and 
vulgar, or in your selfishness a new master arises in 
you, you must destroy it ; not because God has any 
pleasure in mutilation, but because you cannot other- 
wise preserve your better part. It is a hard demand. 



Asceticism 89 

But it is not met by any act of general renunciation 
such as monks perform — the act may leave things just 
as they were before — but only by a struggle and a 
resolute renunciation at the critical point. 

With all these enemies, mammon, care, and selfish- 
ness, what we have to exercise is self-denial^ and 
therewith the relation of Christianity to asceticism is 
determined. Asceticism maintains the theory that all 
worldly blessings are in themselves of no value. This 
is not the theory to which we should be led if we were 
to go by the Gospel ; " for the earth is the Lord\s, and 
the fulness thereof.'"* But according to the Gospel a 
man is to ask : Can and ought I to regard property 
and honour, friends and relations, as blessings, or must 
I put them away .? If certain of Jesus' sayings to this 
effect have been handed down to us in a general form 
and were, no doubt, so uttered, still they must be 
limited by the whole tenour of his discourses. What 
the Gospel asks of us is solemnly to examine ourselves, 
to maintain an earnest watch, and to destroy the enemy. 
There can be no doubt, however, that Jesus demanded 
self-denial and self-renunciation to a much greater 
extent than we like to think. 

To sum up : Ascetic in the primary meaning of the 
word the Gospel is not ; for it is a message of trust in 
God, of humility, of forgiveness of sin, and of mercy. 
This is a height which nothing else can approach, and 
into this sphere nothing else can force its way. 



90 What is Christianity? 

Further, worldly blessings are not of the devil but of 
God — "Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have 
need of all these things ; he arrays the lilies of the 
field and feeds the fowls of the air.""* Asceticism has 
no place in the Gospel at all ; what it asks is that we 
should struggle against mammon, against care, against 
selfishness ; what it demands and disengages is love ; 
the love that serves and is self-sacrificing. This 
struggle and this love are the kind of asceticism which 
the Gospel means, and whoever encumbers Jesus' 
message with any other kind fails to understand it. 
He fails to understand its grandeur and its importance ; 
for there is something still more important than 
"giving one'*s body to be burned and bestowing all 
one''s goods to feed the poor,''"' namely, self-denial 
and love. 

(2) The Gospel and the poor^ or the social qtcestion. 

The bearings of the Gospel in regard to the social 
question form the second point which we proposed to 
consider. It is closely akin to the first. Here also 
we encounter different views prevalent at the present 
moment, or, to be more exact, two views, which are 
mutually opposed. We are told, on the one hand, 
that the Gospel was in the main a great social message 
to the poor, and that everything else in it is of 
secondary importance —mere contemporary wrapping. 



The Social Question 91 

ancient tradition, or new forms supplied by the first 
generations of Christians. Jesus, they say, was a great 
social reformer, who aimed at relieving the lower 
classes from the wretched condition in which they were 
languishing ; he set up a social programme which 
embraced the equality of all men, relief from economical 
distress, and deliverance from misery and oppression. 
It is only so, they add, that he can be understood, and 
therefore so he was ; or perhaps so he was, because 
it is only so that we can understand him. For years 
books and pamphlets have been written dealing with 
the Gospel in this sense ; well-meant performances 
which aim at thus providing Jesus with a defence and 
a recommendation. But amongst those who take the 
Gospel to be an essentially social message there are 
also some who draw the opposite conclusion. By 
trying to prove that Jesus'" message was wholly directed 
to bringing about an economical reform, they declare 
the Gospel to be an entirely Utopian and useless 
programme ; the view, they say, which Jesus took of 
the world was gentle, but also weak ; coming himself 
from the lower and oppressed classes, he shared the 
suspicion entertained by small people of the great and 
the rich ; he abhorred all profitable trade and business ; 
he failed to understand the necessity of acquiring 
wealth ; and accordingly he shaped his programme so 
as to disseminate pauperism in the " world "'' — to him 
the world was Palestine — and then, by way of contrast 



92 What is Christianity? 

with the misery on earth, to build up a kingdom 
in heaven ; a programme unrealisable in itself, and 
offensive to men of energy. This, or something like 
this, is the view held by another section of those who 
identify the Gospel with a social message. 

Opposed to this group of persons, united in the way 
in which they look at the Gospel but divided in their 
opinions in regard to it, there is another group upon 
whom it makes quite a different impression. They 
assert that as for any direct interest on Jesus'* part in 
the economical and social conditions of his age ; nay, 
further, as for any rudimentary interest in economical 
questions in general, it is only read into the Gospel, and 
that with economical questions the Gospel has absolutely 
nothing to do. Jesus, they say, certainly borrowed 
illustrations and examples from the domain of economics, 
and took a personal interest in the poor, the sick, and 
the miserable, but his purely religious teaching and his 
saving activity were in no way directed to any im- 
provement in their earthly position : to say that his 
objects and intentions were of a social character is to 
secularise them. Nay, there are not a few among us 
who think him, like themselves, a " Conservative,"" who 
respected all these existing social differences and 
ordinances as " divinely ordained.*" 

The voices which make themselves heard here are, 
as you will observe, very different, and the different 
points of view are defended with zeal and pertinacity. 




The Social Question 93 

Now, if we are to try to find the position which 
corresponds to the facts, there is, first of all, a brief 
remark to be made on the age in which Jesus lived. 
Our knowledge of the social conditions in Palestine in 
his age and for some considerable time previously does 
not go very far ; but there are certain leading features 
of it which we can establish, and two things more 
particularly which we can assert. 

The governing classes, to which, above all, the 
Pharisees, and also the priests, belonged — the latter 
partly in alliance with the temporal rulers — had little 
feeling for the needs of the people. The condition of 
those classes may not have been much worse than it 
generally is at all times and in all nations, but it was 
bad. Moreover, there was here the additional circum- 
stance that mercy and sympathy with the poor had 
been put into the background by devotion to public 
worship and to the cult of "righteousness.'" Oppres- 
sion and tyranny on the part of the rich had long 
become a standing and inexhaustible theme with the 
Psalmists and with all men of any warm feelings. 
Jesus, too, could not have spoken of the rich as he did 
speak, unless they had grossly neglected their duties. 

In the poor and oppressed classes, in the huge mass 
of want and evil, amongst the multitude of people for 
whom the word " misery *" is often only another expres- 
sion for the word "life,'" nay, is life itself — in this 
multitude there were groups of people at that time, as 



94 What is Christianity? 

we can plainly see, who, with fervent and steadfast 
hope, were hanging upon the promises and consoling 
words of their God, waiting in humility and patience 
for the day when their deliverance was to come. Often 
too poor to pay even for the barest advantages and 
privileges of public worship, oppressed, thrust aside, 
and unjustly treated, they could not raise their eyes 
to the temple ; but they looked to the God of Israel, 
and fervent prayers went up to him : " Watchman, 
what of the night ? '" Thus their hearts were opened to 
God and ready to receive him, and in many of the 
Psalms, and in the later Jewish literature akin to the 
Psalms, the word "poor"*' directly denotes those who 
have their hearts open and are waiting for the con- 
solation of Israel. Jesus found this usage of speech in 
existence and adopted it. Therefore when we come 
across the expression "the poor**** in the Gospels we 
must not think, without further ceremony, of the poor 
in the economic sense. As a matter of fact, poverty in 
the economic sense coincided to a large extent in those 
days with religious humility and an openness of the 
heart towards God, in contrast with the elevated " prac- 
tice of virtue '"* of the Pharisees and its routine obser- 
vance in " righteousness."'' But if this were the prevailing 
condition of affairs, then it is clear that our modern 
categories of " poor '*' and " rich "^ cannot be unreservedly 
transferred to that age. Yet we must not forget that 
in those days the economical sense was also, as a rule, 



The Social Question 95 

included in the word "poor.*" We shall, therefore, 
have to examine in our next lecture the direction in 
which a distinction can be made, or perhaps to ask 
whether it is possible to fix the inner sense of Jesus'* 
words in spite of the peculiar difficulty attaching to the 
conception of " poverty. "" We can have some con- 
fidence, however, that we shall not have to remain in 
obscurity on this point, for in its fundamental features 
the Gospel also throws a bright light upon the field 
covered by this question. 



LECTURE VI 

At the close of the last lecture I referred to the problem 

presented by " the poor ''*' in the Gospel. As a rule, the 

poor of whom Jesus was thinking were also those whose 

hearts are open towards God, and hence what is said of 

them cannot be applied without further ceremony to the 

poor generally. In considering the social question we 

must, therefore, put aside all those sayings of Jesus which 

obviously refer to the poor in the spiritual sense. 

These include, for instance, the first Beatitude, whether 

we accept it in the form in which it appears in Luke or 

in Matthew. The Beatitudes associated with it make 

it clear that Jesus was thinking of the poor whose hearts 

were inwardly open towards God. But, as we have no 

time to go through all the sayings separately, we must 

content ourselves with some leading considerations in 

order to establish the most important points. 

Jesus regarded the possession of worldly goods as a 

grave danger for the soul, as hardening the heart, 

entangling us in earthly cares, and seducing us into a 

vulgar life of pleasure. "A rich man shall hardly 

enter the kingdom of heaven."" 

96 



The Social Question 97 

The contention that Jesus desired, so to speak, to 
bring about a general condition of poverty and distress, 
in order that he might afterwards make it the basis 
of his kingdom of heaven — a contention which we 
encounter in different forms — is erroneous. The very 
opposite is the case. Want he called want, and evil he 
called evil. Far from showing them any favour, he 
made the greatest and strongest efforts to combat and 
destroy them. * In this sense, too, his whole activity 
was a saving activity, that is to say, a struggle against 
evil and against want. Nay, we might almost think that 
he over-estimated the depressing load of poverty and 
affliction ; that he occupied himself too much with it ; 
and that, taking the moral bearings of life as a whole, 
he attributed too great an importance to those forces of 
sympathy and mercy which are expected to counteract 
this state of things. But neither, of course, would this 
view be correct. He knows of a power which he thinks 
still worse than want and misery, namely, sin ; and he 
knows of a force still more emancipating than mercy, 
namely, forgiveness. His discourses and actions leave no 
doubt upon this point. It is certain, therefore, that 
Jesus never and nowhere wished to keep up poverty and 
misery, but, on the contrary, he combated them himself 
and bade others combat them. The Christians who in 
the course of the Church's history were for countenanc- 
ing mendicancy and recommending universal pauper- 
isation, or sentimentally coquetted with misery and 

7 



98 What is Christianity? 

distress, cannot with any show of reason appeal to him. 
Upon those, however, who were anxious to devote their 
whole lives to the preaching of the Gospel and the 
ministry of the Word — he did not ask this of everyone, 
but regarded it as a special caUing from God and a 
special gift — upon them he enjoined the renunciation of 
all that they had, that is to say, all worldly goods. Yet 
that does not mean that he relegated them to a life of 
beggary. On the contrary, they were to be certain that 
they would find their bread and their means of liveli- 
hood. What he meant by that we learn from a saying 
of his which was accidentally omitted from the Gospels, 
but has been handed down to us by the apostle Paul. 
In the ninth chapter of his first epistle to the 
Corinthians he writes : " The Lord hath ordained that 
they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel."'*' 
An absence of worldly possessions he required of the 
ministers of the Word, that is, of the missionaries, in 
order that they might live entirely for their calling. 
But he did not mean that they were to beg. This is a 
Franciscan misconception which is perhaps suggested 
by Jesus' words but carries us away from his meaning. 
In this connexion allow me to digress for a moment 
from our subject. Those members of the Christian 
churches who have become professional evangelists or 
ministers of the Word in their parishes have not, as a 
rule, found it necessary to follow the Lord's injunction 
to dispossess themselves of their worldly goods. So far 



The Social Question 99 

as priests or pastors, as the case may be, and not 
missionaries, are concerned, it may be said with some 
justice that the injunction does not refer to them ; for 
it presupposes that a man has undertaken the office 
of propagating the Gospel. It may be said, further, 
that the Lord's injunctions, over and above those 
relating to the commandment of love, must not be made 
into inviolable laws, as otherwise Christian liberty will 
be impaired, and the high privilege of the Christian 
religion to adapt its shape to the course of history, free 
from all constraint, will be prejudiced. But still it 
may be asked whether it would not have been an extra- 
ordinary gain to Christianity if those who are called 
to be its ministers — the missionaries and pastors — had 
followed the Lord's rules. At the very least, it ought 
to be a strict principle with them to concern themselves 
with property and worldly goods only so far as will 
prevent them being a burden to others, and beyond 
that to renounce them. I entertain no doubt that the 
time will come when the world will tolerate a life of 
luxury among those who are charged with the cure of 
souls as little as it tolerates priestly government. Our 
feelings in this respect are becoming finer, and that is 
an advantage. It will no longer be thought fitting, 
in the higher sense of the word, for anyone to preach 
resignation and contentment to the poor, who is well 
off himself, and zealously concerned for the increase of 
his property. A healthy man may well offer consolation 



lOO What is Christianity? 

to the sick ; but how shall a man of property convince 
those who have none that worldly goods are of no value? 
The Lord's injunction that the minister of the Word is 
to divest himself of worldly possessions will still come 
to be honoured in the history of his communion. 

Jesus laid down no social programme for the sup- 
pression of poverty and distress, if by programme we 
mean a set of definitely prescribed regulations. With 
economical conditions and contemporary circumstances 
he did not interfere. Had he become entangled in 
them ; had he given laws which were ever so salutary 
for Palestine, what would have been gained by it.? 
They would have served the needs of a day, and to- 
morrow would have been antiquated ; to the Gospel 
they would have been a burden and a source of con- 
fusion. We must be careful not to exceed the limits 
set to such injunctions as " Give to him that asketh 
thee,'" and others of a similar kind. They must be 
understood in connexion with the time and the situation. 
They refer to the immediate wants of the applicant, 
which were satisfied with a piece of bread, a drink of 
water, an article of clothing to cover his nakedness. 
We must remember that in the Gospel we are in the 
East, and in circumstances which from an economical 
point of view are somewhat undeveloped. Jesus was no 
social reformer. He could say on occasion, " The poor 
ye have always with you,*'" and thereby, it seems, indicate 
that the conditions would undergo no essential change. 



The Social Question loi 

He refused to be a judge between contending heirs, and 
a thousand problems of economics and social life he 
would have just as resolutely put aside as the unreason- 
able demand that he would settle a question of 
inheritance. Yet again and again people have ventured 
to deduce some concrete social programme from the 
Gospel. Even Protestant theologians have made the 
attempt, and are still making it — an endeavour hopeless 
in itself and full of danger, but absolutely bewildering 
and intolerable when people try to " fill up the gaps '*'' — 
and they are many — to be found in the Gospel with 
regulations and programmes drawn from the Old 
Testament. 

No religion, not even Buddhism, ever went to work 
with such an energetic social message, and so strongly 
identified itself with that message as we see to be the 
case in the Gospel. How so ? Because the words " Love 
thy neighbour as thyself**^ were spoken in deep earnest ; 
because with these words Jesus turned a light upon all 
the concrete relations of life, upon the world of hunger, 
poverty and misery ; because, lastly, he uttered them 
as a religious, nay, as the religious maxim. Let me 
remind you once more of the parable of the Last 
Judgment, where the whole question of a man's worth 
and destiny is made dependent on whether he has 
practised the love of his neighbour; let me remind you 
of the other parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus. 
I should like to cite another story, too^ which is little 



I02 What is Christianity? 

kno^\^l5 because it occurs in this wording, not in our four 
Gospels but in the Gospel of the Hebrews. The story 
of the rich young man is there handed down as 
follows : — " A rich man said to the Lord : Master, what 
good must I do that I may have life ? He answered 
him : Man, keep the law and the prophets. The other 
answered : That have I done. He said to him : Go, sell 
all thy possessions and distribute them to the poor, and 
come and follow me. Then the rich man began to 
scratch his head, and the speech did not please him. 
And the Lord said to him : How canst thou say, I 
have kept the law and the prophets, as it is written in 
the law. Love thy neighbour as thyself? Behold, many 
of thy brethren, sons of Abraham, lie in dirty rags and 
die of hunger, and thy house is full of many goods, and 
nothing comes out of it to them.*" You observe how 
Jesus felt the material ^^'ants of the poor, and how he 
deduced a remedy for such distress from the command- 
ment : " Love thy neighbour as thyself" People ought 
not to speak of loving their neighbours if they can allow 
men beside them to starve and die in misery. It is not 
only that the Gospel preaches solidarity and the helping of 
others ; it is in this message that its real import consists. 
In this sense it is profoundly socialistic, just as it is 
also profoundly individualistic, because it establishes 
the infinite and independent value of every human soul. 
Its tendency to union and brotherliness is not so much 
an accidental phenomenon in its history as the essential 



The Social Question • 103 

feature of its character. The Gospel aims at founding a 
community among men as wide as human hfe itself and 
as deep as human need. As has been truly said, its 
object is to transform the socialism which rests on the 
basis of conflicting interests into the socialism which rests 
on the consciousness of a spiritual unity. In this sense 
its social message can never be outbid. In the course 
of the ages people's opinions as to what constitutes " an 
existence worthy of a man '*' have, thank God, become 
much changed and improved. But Jesus, too, knew of 
this way of measuring things. Did he not once refer, 
almost bitterly, to his own position : " The foxes have 
holes and the birds of the air have nests : but the Son 
of man hath not where to lay his head "^ ? A dwelling, 
sufficient daily bread, cleanliness — all these needs he 
touched upon, and their satisfaction he held to be 
necessary, and a condition of earthly life. If a man 
cannot procure them for himself, others are to step in and 
do it for him. There can be no doubt, therefore, that 
if Jesus were with us to-day he would side with those 
who are making great efforts to relieve the hard lot of 
the poor and procure them better conditions of life. 
The fallacious principle of the free play of forces, of 
the " live and let live "*' principle — a better name for 
it would be the " live and let die "" — is entirely opposed 
to the Gospel. And it is not as our servants, but as our 
brothers, that we are to help the poor. 

Lastly, our riches do not belong to us alone. The 



I04 What is Christianity? 

Gospel has prescribed no regulations as to how we are 
to use them, but it leaves us in no doubt that we are 
to regard ourselves, not as owners but as administrators 
in the service of our neighbour. Nay, it almost looks 
as if Jesus contemplated the possibility of a union 
among men in which wealth, as private property in the 
strict sense of the word, was non-existent. Here, how- 
ever, we touch upon a question which is not easy to 
decide, and which, perhaps, ought not to be raised at 
all, because Jesus^ eschatological ideas and his particular 
horizon enter into it. Nor is it a question that we 
need raise. It is the disposition which Jesus kindled 
in his disciples towards poverty and want that is 
all-important. 

The Gospel is a social message, solemn and over- 
powering in its force ; it is the proclamation of solidarity 
and brotherliness, in favour of the poor. But the 
message is bound up with the recognition of the infinite 
value of the human soul, and is contained in what Jesus 
said about the kingdom of God. We may also assert 
that it is an essential part of what he there said. But 
laws or ordinances or injunctions bidding us forcibly 
alter the conditions of the age in which we may happen 
to be living are not to be found in the Gospel. 



The Gospel and Law 105 

(3) The Gospel and the law^ or the question 
of public order. 

The problem dealing with the relation of the Gospel 
to law embraces two leading questions : (1) the relation 
of the Gospel to constituted authority ; (2) the relation 
of the Gospel to legal ordinances generally, in so far 
as they possess a wider range than is covered by the 
conception " constituted authority/' It is not easy to 
mistake the answer to the first question, but the second 
is more complicated and beset with greater difficulties ; 
and very diverse opinions are entertained in regard 
to it. 

As to Jesus' relation to the constituted authorities of 
his day, I need scarcely remind you again in express 
terms that he was no political revolutionary, and 
that he laid down no political programme. Although 
he is sure that his Father would send him twelve 
legions of angels were he to ask Him, he did not ask 
Him. When they wanted to make him a king, he 
disappeared. Ultimately, indeed, when he thought 
well to reveal himself to the whole nation as the 
Messiah — how he came to the decision and carried 
it out, are points in which we are left in the dark — 
he made his entry into Jerusalem as a king; but 
of the modes of presenting himself which prophecy 
suggested, he chose that which was most remote from 
a political manifestation. The way in which he 



io6 What is Christianity? 

understood his Messianic duty is shown by his driving 
the buyers and sellers from the temple. In this cleansing 
of the temple it was not the constituted authorities 
whom he attacked, but those who had assumed to 
themselves rights of authority over the soul. In every 
nation, side by side with constituted authorities an un- 
constituted authority is established, or rather two con- 
stituted authorities. They are the political church and 
the political parties. What the political church wants, 
in the widest sense of the word and under very various 
guises, is to rule ; to get hold of men's souls and bodies, 
consciences and worldly goods. Wliat political parties 
want is the same ; and when the heads of these parties set 
themselves up as popular leaders, a terrorism is developed 
which is often worse than the fear of royal despots. It 
was not otherwise in Palestine in Jesus'* day. The 
priests and the Pharisees held the nation in bondage 
and murdered its soul. For this unconstituted 
" authority "'* Jesus showed a really emancipating and 
refreshing disrespect. He was never tired of attacking 
it — nay, in his struggle with it he roused himself to a 
state of holy indignation — of exposing its wolfish nature 
and hypocrisy, and of declaring that its day of judg- 
ment was at hand. In whatever domain it had any 
warrant to act, he accepted it : " Go and show yourselves 
unto the priests."" So far as they really proclaimed 
God's law he recognised them : " Whatever they tell you 
to do, that do."' But these were the people to whom he 



The Gospel and Law 107 

read the terrible lecture given in Matt, xxiii. : " Woe 
unto you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites ! for ye are like 
unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful 
outward, but are within full of dead men's bones and of 
all uncleanness.'^" Towards these spiritual " author- 
ities,"'' then, he filled his disciples with a holy want of 
respect, and even of " King "' Herod he spoke with bitter 
irony : " Go ye and tell that fox."' On the other hand, 
so far as we can judge from the scanty evidence before 
us, his attitude towards the real authorities, those who 
wielded the sword, was different. He recognised that 
they had an actual right to be obeyed, and he never 
withdrew his own person from their jurisdiction. Nor are 
we to understand the commandment against swearing 
as including an oath taken before a magistrate. No one 
with a grain of salt, as Wellhausen has rightly said, can 
miss the inner meaning of this commandment. On the 
other hand, we must be careful not to rate Jesus'* 
position in regard to constituted authority too high. 
People usually appeal to the often quoted saying : 
" Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and 
unto God the things that are God's.*" But this saying 
is often misunderstood. Whenever it is explained as 
meaning that Jesus recognised God and Caesar as the 
two powers which in some way or other exist side by 
side, or are even in secret alliance, it is taken in a 
wrong sense. Jesus had no such thought ; on the 
contrary, he spoke of the two powers as separate and 



io8 



What is Christianity 



divorced from each other. God and Caesar are the 
lords of two quite different provinces. Jesus settled 
the question that was in dispute by pointing out this 
difference, which is so great that no conflict between the 
powers can arise. The penny is an earthly coin and 
bears Caesar^s image ; let it be given, then, to Caesar, but 
— this we may take as the complement — the soul and 
all its powers have nothing to do with Caesar ; they 
belong to God. In a word, the all-important matter, 
in Jesus' view, is not to mix up the two provinces. 
When we are once quite clear about this, then we may 
go on to remark on the significance of the fact that 
Jesus enjoined compliance with the demand for payment 
of the imperial taxes. No doubt it is important to note 
that he himself respected the constituted authorities, 
and wished to see them respected ; but in regard to the 
estimate which he formed of them, his language, to say 
the least, is of a neutral character. 

On the other hand, we possess another saying of 
Jesus in regard to constituted authority which is nmch 
less often quoted, and nevertheless affords us a deeper 
insight into the Lord's thoughts than the one which we 
have just discussed. Let us consider it for a moment. 
The fact that it forms a point of transition to the 
consideration of the attitude which Jesus took up in 
regard to legal regulations in general also makes it 
worth our attention. Li Mark x. 42 we read : " Jesus 
called them (i,e, his disciples) to him and saith unto 



The Gospel and Law 109 

them. Ye know that they which are accounted to rule 

over the Gentiles exercise lordship over them : and 

their great ones exercise authority upon them. But so 

shall it not be among you : but whosoever shall be 

great among you shall be your minister : and whosoever 

! of you will be the chiefest shall be servant of all."'' 

Observe here, first of all, the " transvaluation ofvalues."" 

Jesus simply reverses the usual process : to be great and 

to occupy the foremost position means, in his view, to 

serve ; his disciples are to aim, not at ruling, but at 

I each being all other men's servant. Next observe the 

I opinion which he has of authority as it was then 

constituted. Their functions are based on force ^ and 

' this is the very reason which, in Jesus' view, puts them 

( outside the moral sphere ; nay, there is a fundamental 

I opposition between it and them : " Thus do the earthly 

\ rulers.'"* Jesus tells his disciples to act differently. 

i Law and legal ordinance, as resting on force only, on 

I actual power and its exercise, have no moral value. 

I Nevertheless Jesus did not command men not to subject 

I themselves to these authorities ; they were to rate them 

according to their value, that is, according to their 

I non-value, and they were to arrange their own lives on 

I other principles, namely, on the opposite ; they were 

not to use force, but to serve. Here we have already 

passed to the general ground of legal ordinance, for it 

seems to be an essential feature of all law to secure 

observance by force when called in question. 



no What is Christianity? 

When we approach the second point, the relation 
of the Gospel to legal ordinance generally, we again 
encounter two different views. One of them — in 
modern times more particularly maintained, in his 
treatise on Canon Law, by Prof. Sohm of Leipzig, who 
presents points of contact with Tolstoi — lays down that 
in their respective natures law and the world of spiritual 
things are diametrically opposed ; and that it is in 
contradiction with the character of the Gospel and 
the community founded thereon that the Church has 
developed any legal ordinances at all. In his survey of 
the earliest development of the Church Prof. Sohm has 
gone so far as to see in the moment when Christendom 
gave a place in its midst to legal ordinances a second 
Fall. Nevertheless he is unwilling to impugn the law 
in its own province. But Tolstoi refuses, in the name 
of the Gospel, to allow the law any rights at all. He 
maintains that the leading principle of the Gospel is 
that a man is never to insist upon his rights, and that 
not even constituted authority is to offer any external 
resistance to evil. Authority and law are simply to 
cease. Opposed to Tolstoi there are others who more 
or less positively contend that the Gospel takes law and 
legal relations under its protection ; that it sanctifies 
them and thereby raises them into a divine sphere. 
These are, briefly, the two leading points of view which 
are here in conflict. 

As regards the latter, there is little that need be 



The Gospel and Law 1 1 1 

said. It is a mockery of the Gospel to say that it 
protects and sanctifies everything that presents itself 
as law and legal relation at a given moment. Leaving 
a thing alone and bearing with it are not the same 
as sanctioning and preserving it. Nay, it is a serious 
question whether even bearing with it is not too much 
to say, and whether Tolstoi is not right. The difficulty 
of the matter makes it necessary that I should take you 
back a little way in Jewish history. 

For hundreds of years the poor and oppressed in the 

people of Israel had been crying out for justice. It 

was a cry which still moves us to-day as we hear it 

in the words of the prophets and out of the prayers of 

the Psalmists ; but time after time it passed unheeded. 

None of the legal regulations in force was free from 

the power of tyrannical authorities, to be distorted 

and exploited by them just as they saw fit. In speaking 

of legal regulations and their exercise, and in examining 

Jesus' attitude towards them, we must not straightway 

think of our own legal relations, which have grown 

up partly on the basis of Christianity. Jesus was of a 

nation the greater part of which had for generations 

been in vain asking for their rights, and which was 

familiar with law only in the form of force. The 

necessary consequence was that in such a nation a 

feeling of despair arose in regard to the law ; despair, 

as much of the possibility of ever getting justice on 

I earth, as, conversely, of the moral claim of law to have 



112 What is Christianity? 

any validity at all. We can see something of this 
temper even in the Gospel. But there is a second 
consideration which is a standing corrective to this 
temper. Jesus, like all truly religious minds, was 
firmly convinced that in the end God will do justice. 
If He does not do it here, He will do it in the Beyond, 
and that is the main point. In this connexion there 
was, in Jesus'* view, nothing objectionable in the idea 
of law in the sense of a just recompense ; it was a lofty, 
nay, a dominating idea. Just recompense is the 
function of God's majesty ; to what extent it is 
modified by His mercy is a question which we need 
not here consider. The contention that Jesus took a 
disparaging view of law as such, and of the exercise of 
law, cannot be sustained for a moment. On the con- 
trary, everyone is to get his rights ; nay more, his 
disciples are one day to share in administering God'*s 
justice and themselves judge. It was only the justice 
which was exercised with violence and therefore un- 
justly, the justice which lay upon the nation like a 
tyrannical and bloody decree, that he set aside. He 
believed in true justice, and he was certain, too, that 
it would prevail ; so certain, that he did not think it 
necessary for justice to use force in order to remain 
justice. 

This brings us to the last point. We possess 
a number of Jesus' sayings in which he directs his 
disciples to renounce all their lawful demands, and so 



The Gospel and Law 113 

forego their just rights. You all know those sayings. 
Let me remind you of one only : " But I say unto you, 
That ye resist not evil, but whosoever shall smite thee 
on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. And 
if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy 
coat, let him have thy cloak also.'" The demand here 
made seems to proscribe law and disorganise all the 
legal relations of life. Again and again these words 
have been appealed to with the object of showing 
either that Christianity is incompatible with life as it 
actually is, or that Christendom has fallen away from 
the principles of its Master. By w^ay of reply to this 
argument the following observations may be made : — 
(i.) Jesus was, as we have seen, steeped in the conviction 
that God does justice ; in the end, therefore, the 
oppressor will not prevail and the oppressed will get 
his rights, (ii.) Earthly rights are in themselves of 
little account, and it does not much matter if we lose 
them, (iii.) The world is in such an unhappy state, 
injustice has got so much the upper hand in it, that 
the victim of oppression is incapable of making good 
his rights even if he tries, (iv.) As God — and this is 
the main point — mingles His justice with mercy, and 
lets His sun shine on the just and on the unjust, so 
Jesus"* disciple is to show love to his enemies and disarm 
them by gentleness. Such are the thoughts which 
underlie those lofty sayings and at the same time set 
them their due limits. And is the demand which they 

8 



114 What is Christianity? 

contain really so supramundane, so impossible ? Do we 
not in the circle of our family and friends advise those 
who belong to us to act in the same way, and not to 
return evil for evil and abuse for abuse ? What family, 
what society, could continue to exist, if every member 
of it were anxious only to pursue his own rights, and 
did not learn to renounce them even when attacked? 
Jesus regards his disciples as a circle of friends, and he 
looks out beyond this circle to a league of brothers 
which will take shape in the future and extend. But, 
we are asked, are we in all cases to renounce the pursuit 
of our rights in the face of our enemies ? are we to 
use no weapons but those of gentleness ? To speak 
with Tolstoi, are the magistrates not to inflict punish- 
ment, and thereby to be effaced ? are nations not to 
fight for house and home when they are wantonly 
attacked? I venture to maintain that when Jesus 
spoke the words which I have quoted, he was not 
thinking of such cases, and that to interpret them 
in this direction involves a clumsy and dangerous mis- 
conception of their meaning. Jesus never had anyone 
but the individual in mind, and the abiding disposition 
of the heart in love. To say that this disposition 
cannot coexist with the pursuit of one's own rights, 
with the conscientious administration of justice, and 
with the stern punishment of crime, is a piece of pre- 
judice, in support of which we may appeal in vain to 
the letter of those sayings, which did not aim at being 



The Gospel and Law 115 

laws — that is, at prescribing regulations. This much, 
however, must be added, in order that the loftiness of 
the demand which the Gospel makes may be in no way 
abated : Jesus'* disciple ought to be able to renounce 
the pursuit of his rights, and ought to co-operate in 
forming a nation of brothers, in which justice is done 
no longer by the aid of force, but by free obedience to 
the good, and which is united, not by legal regulations, 
but by the ministry of love. 



LECTURE VII. 

We were occupied in the last lecture with the relation 
of the Gospel to law and legal ordinance. We saw 
that Jesus was convinced that God does, and will do, 
justice. We saw, further, that he demanded of his 
disciples that they should be able to renounce their 
rights. In giving expression to this demand, far from 
having all the circumstances of his own time in mind, 
still less the more complex conditions of a later age, 
he has one and one only present to his soul, namely, 
the relation of every man to the kingdom of God. 
Because a man is to sell all that he has in order to 
buy the pearl of great price, so he must also be able 
to abandon his earthly rights and subordinate every- 
thing to that highest relation. But in connexion with 
this message of his, Jesus opens up to us the prospect 
of a union among men, which is held together, not by 
any legal ordinance, but by the rule of love, and 
where a man conquers his enemy by gentleness. It 
is a' high and glorious ideal, and we have received it 
from the very foundation of our religion. It ought to 

float before our eyes as the goal and guiding star of 

116 



The Gospel and Law 117 

our historical development. Whether mankind will 
ever attain to it, who can say ? but we can and ought 
to approximate to it, and in these days — otherwise 
than two or three hmidred years ago — we feel a moral 
obligation in this direction. Those of us who possess 
more delicate and therefore more prophetic perceptions 
no longer regard the kingdom of love and peace as a 
mere Utopia. 

But for this very reason there are many among us 
to-day upon whom a very serious and difficult question 
presses with redoubled force. We see a whole class 
struggling for its rights ; or, rather, we see it struggling 
to extend and increase its rights. Is that compatible 
with the Christian temper ? Does not the Gospel 
forbid such a struggle ? Have we not been told that 
we are to renounce the rights we have, to say nothing 
of trying to get more ? Must we, then, as Christians, 
recall the labouring classes from the struggle for 
their rights, and exhort them only to patience and 
submission ? 

The problem with which we have here to do is also 
stated more or less in the form of an accusation against 
Christianity. Earnest men in political circles of a 
socialistic tendency, who would gladly be guided by 
Jesus Christ, complain that in this matter the Gospel 
leaves them in the lurch. They say that it imposes 
restraint upon aspirations which with a clear conscience 
they feel to be justified ; that in requiring absolute 



ii8 What is Christianity? 

meekness and submission it disarms everyone who wants 
to fight ; that it narcotises, as it were, all real energy. 
Some say this with pain and regret, others with satis- 
faction. The latter assert that they always knew that 
the Gospel was not for the healthy and the strong, but 
for the broken-down ; that it knows, and wants to 
know, nothing of the fact that life, and especially 
modern life, is a struggle, a struggle for one's own 
rights. What answer are we to give them ? 

My own opinion is that these statements and com- 
plaints are made by people who have never yet clearly 
realised with what the Gospel is concerned, and who 
rashly and improperly connect it with earthly things. 
The Gospel makes its appeal to the inner man, who, 
whether he is healthy or sick, in a happy position or a 
miserable, obliged to spend his earthly life fighting or 
quietly maintaining what he has won, always remains 
the same. " My kingdom is not of this world '" ; it is 
no earthly kingdom that the Gospel establishes. Not 
only are these words inconsistent with such a political 
theocracy as the Pope aims at setting up and with all 
worldly dominion ; they go much further, and forbid 
all direct and formal interference of religion in worldly 
affairs. What the Gospel does say is this : Whoever 
you may be, and whatever your position, whether bond- 
man or free, whether fighting or at rest — your real 
business in life is always the same. There is only one 
relation and one idea which you must not violate, and 



The Gospel and Law 119 

in the face of which all others are only varied trappings 
and vain show : to be a child of God and a citizen of 
His kingdom, and to exercise love. How you are to 
maintain yourself in this life on earth, and in what way 
you are to serve your neighbour, is left to you and your 
own liberty of action. This is what the apostle Paul 
understood by the Gospel, and I do not believe that 
he misunderstood it. Then let us fight, let us struggle, 
let us get justice for the oppressed, let us order the 
circumstances of the world as we with a clear conscience 
can, and as we may think best for our neighbour ; but 
do not let us expect the Gospel to afford us any direct 
help ; let us make no selfish demands for ourselves ; 
and let us not forget that the world passes away, not 
only with the lusts thereof, but also with its regulations 
and its goods ! Once more be it said : the Gospel 
knows only one goal, one idea ; and it demands of a 
man that he shall never put them aside. If the exhor- 
tation to renounce takes, in any narrow and austere 
way, a foremost place in Jesus'* words, it is to impress 
upon us the paramount and exclusive claims of the 
relation to God and the idea of love. The Gospel is 
above all questions of mundane development; it is 
concerned not with material things but with the souls 
of men. 

With this we have already passed to the next 
question which was to occupy our attention, and we 
have half answered it. 



I20 What is Christianity? 

(4) The Gospel and worTc^ or the question of 
civilisation. 

The points which we shall have to consider here are 
essentially the same as those which we emphasised in 
regard to the question just discussed; and we shall 
therefore be able to proceed more concisely. 

Jesus'* teaching has been felt again and again, but 
above all in our own day, to exhibit no interest in any 
systematic work or calling, and no appreciation of 
those ideal possessions which go by the name of Art 
and Science. Nowhere, people say, does Jesus summon 
men to labour and to put their hands to the work of 
progress ; in vain shall we look in his words for any 
expression of pleasure in vigorous activity ; these ideal 
possessions lay far beyond his field of vision. In that 
last unhappy book of his. The Old Faith and the New^ 
David Friedrich Strauss gave particularly harsh expres- 
sion to this feeling. He speaks of a fundamental 
defect in the Gospel, which he considers antiquated and 
useless because out of sympathy with the progress of 
civilisation. But long before Strauss the Pietistic 
movement exhibited the same sort of feeling. The 
Pietists tried to evade the difficulty in a way of their 
own. They started from the position that Jesus must 
be able to serve as a direct example for all men, what- 
ever their calling ; must have proved his capacity in 
all the situations in which a man can be placed. They 



Civilisation 121 

admitted that a cursory examination of Jesus' life dis- 
closed the fact that this requirement was not fulfilled ; 
but they were of opinion that on a closer inspection it 
would be found that he was really the best bricklayer, 
the best tailor, the best judge, the best scholar, and so 
on, and that he had the best knowledge and under- 
standing of everything. They turned and twisted what 
Jesus said and did until it was made to express and 
corroborate what they wanted. Although it was a 
childish attempt that they made, the problem of which 
they were sensible was nevertheless of some moment. 
They felt that their consciences and their callings 
bound them to a definite activity and a definite busi- 
ness ; they were clear that they ought not to become 
monks ; and yet they were anxious to practise the 
imitation of Christ in the full sense. They felt, then, 
that he must have stood in the same situation as they 
themselves, and that his horizon must have been the 
same as theirs. 

Here we have the same case as we dealt with in the 
last section, only covering a wider field. Again and 
again the error recurs that the Gospel has to do with 
the affairs of the world, and that it is its business to 
prescribe how they are to be carried on. Here, too, 
the old and almost ineradicable tendency of mankind to 
rid itself of its freedom and responsibility in higher 
things and subject itself to a law, comes into play. 
It is much easier, in fact, to resign oneself to any, 



122 What is Christianity? 

even the sternest, kind of authority, than to hve in 
the liberty of the good. But putting this aside, 
the question remains : Is it not a real defect in the 
Gospel that it betrays so little sympathy with the 
business of life, and is out of touch with the humani- 
or a in the sense of knowledge, art, and civilisation 
generally ? 

I answer, in the first place : What would have been 
gained if it had not possessed this " defect "' ? Suppose 
that it had taken an active interest in all those 
efforts, would it not have become entangled in them, or, 
at any rate, have incurred the risk of appearing to 
be so entangled ? Labour, art, science, the progress of 
civilisation — these are not things which exist in the 
abstract ; they exist in the particular phase of an age. 
The Gospel, then, would have had to ally itself with 
them. But phases change. In the Roman Church of 
to-day we see how heavily religion is burdened by being 
connected with a particular epoch of civilisation. In 
the Middle Ages this Church, anxious to participate 
to the full in all questions of progress and civilisation, 
gave them form and shape, and laid down their laws. 
Insensibly, however, the Church identified its sacred 
inheritance and its peculiar mission with the know- 
ledge, the maxims, and the interests which it then 
acquired ; so that it is now, as it were, firmly 
pinned down to the philosophy, the political economy, 
in short, to the whole civilisation, of the Middle 



Civilisation 123 

Ages. On the other hand, what a service the Gospel 
has rendered to mankind by having sounded the notes 
of rehgion in mighty chords and banished every other 
melody ! 

In the second place, labour and the progress of 
civilisation are, no doubt, very precious, and summon 
us to strenuous exertion. But they do not comprise 
the highest ideal. They are incapable of filling the 
soul with real satisfaction. Although work may give 
pleasure, that is only one aspect of the matter. I have 
always found that the people who talk loudest about 
the pleasure which work affords make no very great 
effort themselves ; whilst those who are uninterruptedly 
engaged in heavy labour are hesitating in its praises. 
As a matter of fact, there is a great deal of hypocritical 
twaddle talked about work. Three-fourths of it and 
more is nothing but stupefying toil, and the man who 
really works hard shares the poet's aspirations as he 
looks forward to the evening : 

Head, hands, and feet rejoice : the ivork is done. 

And, then, think of the results of all this labour ! 
When a man has done a piece of work, he would like 
to do it over again, and the knowledge of its defects 
falls heavily on soul and conscience. No ! it is not in 
so far as we work that we live, but in so far as we 
rejoice in the love of others, and ourselves exercise love. 
Faust is right : Labour which is labour and nothing 



124 What is Christianity? 

else becomes an aversion. We long for the streams of 
living water, and for the spring itself from which those 
waters flow : 

Man sehnt sick nach des Lebens B'dchen^ 
Ach ! nach des Lebens Quelle kin. 

Labour is a valuable safety-valve and useful in keep- 
ing off greater ills, but it is not in itself an absolute 
good, and we cannot include it amongst our ideals. 
The same may be said of the progress of civilisation. 
It is of course to be welcomed ; but the piece of pro- 
gress in which we delight to-day becomes something 
mechanical by to-morrow, and leaves us cold. The man 
of any deep feeling will thankfully receive anything 
that the development of progress may bring him ; but 
he knows very well that his situation inwardly — the 
problems that agitate him and the fundamental position 
in which he stands — is not essentially, nay, is scarcely 
even unessentially, altered by it all. It is only for a 
moment that it seems as if something new were coming, 
and a man were being really relieved of his burden. 
Gentlemen, when a man grows older and sees more 
deeply into life, he does not find, if he possesses any 
inner world at all, that he is advanced by the external 
march of things, by "the progress of civilisation.**'' 
Nay, he feels himself, rather, where he was before, and 
forced to seek the sources of strength which his fore- 
fathers also sought. He is forced to make himself a 



Civilisation 125 

native of the kingdom of God, the kingdom of the 
Eternal, the kingdom of Love ; and he comes to under- 
stand that it was only of this kingdom that Jesus 
Christ desired to speak and to testify, and he is grateful 
to him for it. 

But, in the third place, Jesus had a strong and 
positive conviction of the aggressive and forward 
character of his message. " I am come to send fire 
on the earth, and "' — he added — " what will I if it be 
already kindled.?" The fire of the judgment and the 
forces of love were what he wanted to call forth, in 
order to create a new humanity. If he spoke of these 
forces of love in the simple manner corresponding to 
the conditions nearest at hand — the feeding of the 
hungry, the clothing of the naked, the visiting of the 
sick and those in prison — it is nevertheless clear that 
a great inward transformation of the humanity which 
he saw in the mirror of the little nation in Palestine 
hovered before his eyes : " One is your master, and all 
ye are brethren.'**' The last hour is come ; but in the 
last hour from a small seed a tree is to grow up which 
shall spread its branches far and wide. Further, he 
was revealing the knowledge of God, and he was certain 
that it would ripen the young, strengthen the weak, 
and make them God's champions. Knowledge of God 
is the spring that is to fructify the barren field, and 
pour forth streams of living water. In this sense he 
spoke of it as the highest and the only necessary good, 



126 What is Christianity? 



ii 



as the condition of all edification, and, we may also 
say, of all true growth and progress. Lastly, he saw 
on his horizon not only the judgment, but also a king- 
dom of justice, of love, and of peace, which, though 
it came from heaven, was nevertheless for this earth. 
When it is to come, he himself knows not — the hour 
is known to the Father only ; but he knows how and 
by what means it will spread; and side by side with 
the highly-coloured, dramatic pictures which pass 
through his soul he has a quiet vision of things that 
are fixed and steady ; he sees the vineyard of God on 
this earth and God calling His labourers into it — happy 
the man who receives a call ! — he sees them working in 
the vineyard, standing no longer idle in the market- 
place, and at last receiving their reward. Or take 
the parable of the talents distributed in order to be 
employed, and therefore not to be buried in a napkin. 
A day's work, labour, increase, progress — he sees it 
all, but placed at the service of God and neighbour, 
encircled by the light of the Eternal, and removed 
from the service of transient things. 

To sum up what we have here tried to indicate : Is 
the complaint from which we started at the beginning 
of this section justified ? Ought we really to desire 
that the Gospel had adapted itself to " the progress of 
civilisation *" ? Here, too, I think, we have to learn 
from the Gospel and not to find fault with it. It tells 
us of the real work which humanity has to accomplish. 



Christology 127 

and we ought not to meet its message by entrenching 
ourselves behind our miserable " work of civilisation." 
"The image of Christ,'' as a modern historian justly 
says, " remains the sole basis of all moral culture, and in 
the measure in which it succeeds in making its light 
penetrate is the moral culture of the nations increased 
or diminished/' 



(5) The Gospel and the Son of God^ or the 
Christological question. 

We now pass from the group of questions of which 
we have been treating hitherto. There were four of 
them, all intimately connected with one another. 
Failure to answer them rightly always proceeds from not 
rating the Gospel high enough ; from somehow or 
other dragging it down to the level of mundane ques- 
tions and entangling it in them. Or, to put the matter 
differently : The forces of the Gospel appeal to the 
deepest foundations of human existence and to them 
only ; it is there alone that their leverage is applied. 
If a man is unable, then, to go down to the root of 
humanity, and has no feeling for it and no knowledge of 
it, he will fail to understand the Gospel, and w^ill then 
try to profane it or else complain that it is of no use. 

We now, however, approach quite a different problem : 
What position did Jesus himself take up towards the 
Gospel while he was proclaiming it, and how did he wish 



128 What is Christianity? 

himself to be accepted ? We are not yet dealing with 
the way in which his disciples accepted him, or the place 
which they gave him in their hearts, and the opinion 
which they formed of him ; we are now speaking only of 
his own testimony of himself. But the question is one 
which lands us in the great sphere of controverted 
questions which cover the history of the Church from 
the first century up to our own time. In the course of 
this controversy men put an end to brotherly fellowship 
for the sake of a nuance ; and thousands were cast out, 
condemned, loaded with chains and done to death. It 
is a gruesome story. On the question of" Christology ^' 
men beat their religious doctrines into terrible weapons, 
and spread fear and intimidation everywhere. This atti- 
tude still continues : Christology is treated as though the 
Gospel had no other problem to offer, and the accom- 
panying fanaticism is still rampant in our own day. 
Who can wonder at the difficulty of the problem, 
weighed down as it is with such a burden of history and 
made the sport of parties ? Yet anyone who will look 
at our Gospels with unprejudiced eyes will not find that 
the question of Jesus' own testimony is insoluble. So 
much of it, however, as remains obscure and mysterious 
to our minds ought to remain so ; as Jesus meant it to 
be, and as in the very nature of the problem it is. It is 
only in pictures that we can give it expression. " There 
are phenomena which cannot, without the aid of symbols, 
be brought within the range of the understanding." 



Christology 129 

Before we examine Jesus' own testimony about him- 
self, two leading points must be established. In the 
first place, he desired no other belief in his person 
and no other attachment to it than is contained in the 
keeping of his commandments. Even with the fourth 
evangelist, who often seems to raise Jesus'" person above 
the contents of the Gospel, the idea is still clearly 
formulated : " If ye love me, keep my commandments." 
He must himself have found, during his labours, that 
some people honoured, nay, even trusted him, without 
troubling themselves about the contents of his message. 
It was to them that he addressed the reprimand : " Not 
every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter 
into the kingdom of heaven ; but he that doeth the will 
of my Father."" To lay down any " doctrine "' about his 
person and his dignity independently of the Gospel was, 
then, quite outside his sphere of ideas. In the second 
place, he described the Lord of heaven and earth as his 
God and his Father ; as the Greater, and as Him who 
is alone good. He is certain that everything which 
he has and everything which he is to accomplish comes 
from this Father. He prays to Him ; he subjects 
himself to His will ; he struggles hard to find out 
what it is and to fulfil it. Aim, strength, under- 
standing, the issue, and the hard must^ all come from 
the Father. This is what the Gospels say, and it 
cannot be turned and twisted. This feeling, praying, 

working, struggling and suffering individual is a man 

9 



130 What is Christianity? 

who in the face of his God also associates himself 
with other men. 

These two facts mark out, as it were, the boundaries 
of the ground covered by Jesus' testimony of himself. 
They do not, it is true, give us any positive information 
as to what he said ; but we shall understand what he 
really meant by his testimony if we look closely at the 
two descriptions which he gave of himself: the Son of 
God and the Messiah (the Son of David, the Son 
of Man). 

The first designation, " the Son of God,*" Messianic 
though it may have been in its original conception, 
lies very much nearer to our modern way of thinking 
than the second, for Jesus himself gave a meaning to 
this conception which almost takes it out of the class 
of Messianic ideas, or at all events does not make its 
conclusion in that class necessary to a proper understand- 
ing of it. On the other hand, unless we are willing to 
be content with a dead word, the designation "the 
Messiah *''' is at first blush one that is quite foreign to 
our ideas. Without some explanation we cannot under- 
stand — nay, unless we are Jews, we cannot understand 
at all — what this dignity means and what rank and char- 
acter it possesses. It is only when we have ascertained 
its meaning by historical study that we can ask whether 
the word has a significance which in any way survives 
the destruction of the husk in which it took shape in 
Jewish political life. 



Christology 131 

Let us first of all consider the designation, " Son of 
God."** Jesus in one of his discourses made it specially 
clear why and in what sense he gave himself this name. 
The saying is to be found in Matthew, and not, as 
might perhaps have been expected, in John : " No man 
knoweth the Son but the Father ; neither knoweth any 
man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever 
the Son will reveal him.'** It is " knowledge of God '^ 
that makes the sphere of the Divine Sonship. It is 
in this knowledge that he came to know the sacred 
Being who rules heaven and earth as Father, as his Father. 
The consciousness which he possessed of being the Son of 
God is, therefore, nothing but the practical consequence 
of knowing God as the Father and as his Father. 
Rightly understood, the name of Son means nothing 
but the knowledge of God. Here, however, two 
observations are to be made : Jesus is convinced that 
he knows God in a way in which no one ever knew Him 
before, and he knows that it is his vocation to com- 
municate this knowledge of God to others by word and 
by deed — and with it the knowledge that men are God's 
children. In this consciousness he knows himself to be 
the Son called and instituted of God, to be the Son of 
God, and hence he can say : My God and my Father, 
and into this invocation he puts something which 
belongs to no one but himself. How he came to this 
consciousness of the unique character of his relation to 
God as a Son ; how he came to the consciousness of his 



132 What is Christianity? 

power, and to the consciousness of the obhgation and 
the mission which this power carries with it, is his secret, 
and no psychology will ever fathom it. The confidence 
with which John makes him address the Father : 
" Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world,**** 
is undoubtedly the direct reflection of the certainty with 
which Jesus himself spoke. No research can carry us 
further. We are not even able to say when it was 
that he first knew himself as the Son, and whether he 
at once completely identified himself with this idea and 
let his individuality be absorbed in it, or whether it 
formed an inner problem which kept him in constant 
suspense. Only a man who had had a similar experience 
himself could do anything to fathom this mystery. I^et 
a prophet try, if he chooses, to raise the veil, but, for 
our part, we must be content with the fact that this 
Jesus who preached humility and knowledge of self 
nevertheless named himself and himself alone as the Son 
of God. He is certain that he knows the Father, that 
he is to bring this knowledge to all men, and that 
thereby he is doing the work of God. Among all the 
works of God this is the greatest ; it is the aim and end 
of all creation. The work is given to him to do, and 
in God's strength he will accomplish it. It was out 
of this feeling of power and in the prospect of victory 
that he uttered the words : " The Father hath com- 
mitted all things unto me." Again and again in the 
history of mankind men of God have come forward in 



Christology 133 

the siu'e consciousness of possessing a divine message, and 
of being compelled, whether they will or not, to deliver 
it. But the message has always hapened to be imperfect ; 
in this spot or that, defective ; bound up with political 
or particularistic elements ; designed to meet the circum- 
stances of the moment ; and very often the prophet did 
not stand the test of being himself an example of his 
message. But in this case the message brought w^as of 
the profoundest and most comprehensive character ; it 
went to the very root of mankind and, although set in 
the framework of the Jewish nation, it addressed itself 
to the whole of humanity — the message from God the 
Father. Defective it is not, and its real kernel may be 
readily freed from the inevitable husk of contemporary 
form. Antiquated it is not, and in life and strength 
it still triumphs to-day over all the past. He who 
delivered it has as yet yielded his place to no man, and 
to human life he still to-day gives a meaning and an 
aim — he the Son of God, 

This already brings us to the other designation which 
Jesus gave of himself: the Messiah, Before I attempt 
briefly to explain it, I ought to mention that some 
scholars of note — and among them Wellhausen — have 
expressed a doubt whether Jesus described himself as 
the Messiah. In that doubt I cannot concur; nay, I 
think that it is only bv wrenching what the evangelists 
tell us off its hinges that the opinion can be maintained. 
The very expression " Son of Man '' — that Jesus used it 



134 What is Christianity? 

is beyond question — seems to me to be intelligible only 
in a Messianic sense. To say nothing of anything else, 
such a story as that of Christ's entry into Jerusalem 
would have to be simply expunged, if the theory is to be 
maintained that he did not consider himself the promised 
Messiah and also desire to be accepted as such. More- 
over, the forms in which Jesus expressed what he felt 
about his own consciousness and his vocation become 
quite incomprehensible unless they are taken as the out- 
come of the Messianic idea. Finally, the positive argu- 
ments which are advanced in support of the theory are 
either so very weak, or else so highly questionable, that we 
may remain quite sure that Jesus called himself the Messiah. 
The idea of a Messiah and the Messianic notions 
generally, as they existed in Jesus' day, had been 
developed on two combined lines — on the line of the 
kings and on that of the prophets. Alien influences 
had also been at work, and the whole idea was trans- 
figured by the ancient expectation that God Himself in 
visible form would take up the government of His 
people. The leading features of the Messianic idea 
were taken from the Israelitish kingdom in the ideal 
splendour in which it was invested after the kingdom 
itself had disappeared. Memories of Moses and of the 
great prophets also played a part in it. In the following 
lecture we shall briefly show what shapes the Messianic 
hopes had assumed up to Jesus' time, and in what way 
he took them up and transformed them. 



LECTURE VIII. 

Although the Messianic doctrines prevalent in the 
Jewish nation in Jesus'* day were not a positive 
"dogma,"'' and had no connexion with the legal 
ordinances which had been so rigidly elaborated, they 
formed an essential element of the hopes, religious 
and political, which the nation entertained for the 
future. They were of no very definite character, except 
in certain fundamental features ; beyond these the 
greatest differences prevailed. The old prophets had 
looked forward to a glorious future in which God would 
Himself come down, destroy the enemies of Israel, and 
work justice, peace, and joy. At the same time, 
however, they had also promised that a w ise and mighty 
king of the House of David would appear and bring 
this glorious state of things to pass. They had ended 
by indicating the people of Israel itself as the Son of 
God, chosen from amongst the nations of the world. 
These three points came to be the standard by which 
the Messianic ideas were subsequently elaborated. The 
hope of a glorious future for the people of Israel 

remained the frame into which all expectations 

135 



136 What is Christianity? 

were fitted, but in the two centuries before Christ the 
following factors were added : (i.) The extension of 
their historical horizon strengthened the interest of 
the Jews in the nations of the world, introduced the 
notion of '' mankind "** as a whole and brought it within 
the sphere of the expected end, including, therefore, 
the operations of the Messiah. The day of judgment 
is regarded as extending to the whole world, and the 
Messiah not only as judging the world but as ruling it 
as well, (ii.) Although the moral purification of the 
people had already been thought of earlier in connexion 
with the glorious future, the destruction of IsraePs 
enemies seemed to be the main consideration ; now, 
however, the feeling of moral responsibility and the 
knowledge of God as the Holy One became more active ; 
the view comes to prevail that the Messianic age 
demands a holy people, and that the judgment must 
therefore of necessity also be a judgment upon a part 
of Israel itself. (iii.) As individualism became a 
stronger force, so the relation of God to the individual 
was prominently emphasised. The individual Israelite 
comes to feel that he is in the midst of his people, and 
he begins to look upon it as a sum of individuals ; the 
individual belief in Providence appears side by side 
with the political belief, and combines with the feeling 
of personal worth and responsibiHty ; and in connexion 
with the expectation of the end we get the first dawn 
of the hope of an eternal life and the fear of eternal 



The Messiah 137 

punishment. The products of this inner development 
are an interest in personal salvation and a belief in the 
resurrection, and the roused conscience is no longer able 
to hope for a glorious future for all in view of the open 
profanity of the people and the power of sin ; only a 
remnant will be saved, (iv.) The expectations for the 
future become more and more transcendent ; they are 
increasingly shifted to the realm of the supernatural 
and the supramundane ; something quite new comes 
down from heaven to earth, and the new course on 
which the world enters severs it from the old ; nay, this 
earth, transfigured as it will be, is no longer the final 
goal ; the idea of an absolute bliss arises, whose abode 
can only be heaven itself, (v.) The personality of the 
long-expected Messiah is sharply distinguished, as well 
from the idea of an earthly king as from the idea of 
the people as a whole, and from the idea of God. 
Although he appears as a man amongst men, the 
Messiah retains scarcely any Messianic traits. He is 
represented as with God from the first beginnings of 
time ; he comes down from heaven, and accomplishes 
his work by superhuman means ; the moral traits in 
the picture formed of him come into prominence ; he is 
the perfectly just man who fulfils all the command- 
ments. Nay, the idea that others benefit by his 
merits forces its way in. The notion, however, of a 
suffering Messiah, which might seem to be suggested by 
Isaiah liii., is not reached. 



138 What is Christianity? 

But none of these speculations succeeded in dis- 
placing the older and simpler conceptions, or in 
banishing that original, patriotic, and political inter- 
pretation of them with which the great majority of 
the people were familiar. God Himself assuming the 
sceptre, destroying His enemies, founding the Israelitish 
kingdom of the world, and availing Himself of a 
kingly champion for the purpose ; every man sitting 
under his own fig-tree, in his own vineyard, enjoying 
the fruits of peace, with his foot upon the neck of his 
enemies — that, after all, was still the most popular 
conception of the coming of the Messiah, and it was 
fixed in the minds even of those who were at the same 
time attracted to higher views. But a portion of the 
people had undoubtedly awakened to the feeling that 
the kingdom of God presupposes a moral condition of 
a corresponding character, and that it could come only 
to a righteous people. Some looked to acquiring this 
righteousness by means of a punctilious observance of 
the law, and no zeal that they could show for it was 
enough ; others, under the influences of a deeper self- 
knowledge, began to have a dim idea that the right- 
eousness which they so ardently desired could itself 
come only from the hand of God, and that in order to 
shake off the burden of sin — for they had begun to be 
tortured by an inner sense of it — divine assistance, and 
divine grace and mercy, were needful. 

Thus in Christ's time there was a surging chaos of 



The Messiah 139 

opposite feelings, as well as of contradictory theories, 
in regard to this one matter. At no other time, 
perhaps, in the history of religion, and in no other 
people, were the most extreme antitheses so closely 
associated under the binding influence of religion. At 
one moment the horizon seems as narrow as the circle 
of the hills which surround Jerusalem ; at another it 
embraces all mankind. Here everything is put upon a 
high plane and regarded from the spiritual and moral 
point of view ; and there, at but a stone*'s throw, the 
whole drama seems as though it must close with a 
political victory for the nation. In one group all the 
forces of divine trust and confidence are disengaged, 
and the devout man struggles through to a solemn 
" Nevertheless '"* ; in another, every religious impulse is 
stifled by a patriotic but morally obtuse fanaticism. 

The idea which was formed of the Messiah must 
have been as contradictory as the hopes to w^hich it 
was meant to respond. Not only were people's formal 
notions about him continually changing — questions 
were being raised, for instance, as to the sort of bodily 
nature w^hich he would have — above all, his inmost 
character and the work to which he was to be called 
appeared in diverse lights. But, wherever the moral 
and really religious elements had begun to get the 
upper hand, people were forced to abandon the image 
of the political and w^arlike ruler, and let that of the 
prophet^ which had always to some extent helped to 



140 What is Christianity? 

form the general notion about the Messiah, take its 
place. That he would bring God near ; that somehow 
or other he would do justice ; that he would deliver 
from the burden of torment within — this was what 
was hoped of him. The story of John the Baptist as 
related in our Gospels makes it clear that there were 
devout men in the Jewish nation at that time who were 
expecting a Messiah in this form, or at least did not 
absolutely reject the idea. We learn from that story 
that some were disposed to take John for the Messiah. 
What elasticity the Messianic ideas must have possessed, 
and how far, in certain circles, they must have travelled 
from the form which they originally assumed, when this 
very unkinglike preacher of repentance, clad in a 
garment of camel's hair, and with no message but that 
the nation had degenerated and its day of judgment 
was at hand, could be taken for the Messiah himself. 
And when the Gospels go on to tell us that not a few 
among the people took Jesus for the Messiah only 
because he taught as one with authority, and worked 
miraculous cures, how fundamentally the idea of the 
Messiah seems to be changed ! They regarded this 
saving activity, it is true, only as the beginning of his 
mission ; they expected that the wonder-worker would 
presently throw off his disguise and " set up the 
kingdom "^ ; but all that we are concerned with here is 
that they were capable of welcoming as the promised 
one a man whose origin and previous life they knew. 



The Messiah 141 

and who had as yet done nothing but preach repentance 
and proclaim that the kingdom of heaven was at hand. 
We shall never fathom the inward development by 
which Jesus passed from the assurance that he was the 
Son of God to the other assurance that he was the 
promised Messiah. But when we see that the idea 
which others as well had formed of the Messiah at that 
time had, by a slow process of change, developed 
entirely new features, and had passed from a political 
and religious idea into a spiritual and religious one — 
when we see this, the problem no longer wears a 
character of complete isolation. That John the Baptist 
and the twelve disciples acknowledged Jesus to be the 
Messiah ; that the positive estimate which they formed 
of his person did not lead them to reject the shape in 
which he appeared, but, on the contrary, was fixed in 
this very shape, is a proof of the flexible character of 
the Messianic idea at the time, and also explains how it 
was that Jesus could himself adopt it. " Strength is 
made perfect in weakness.'" That there is a divine 
strength and glory which stands in no need of earthly 
power and earthly splendour, nay, excludes them ; that 
there is a majesty of holiness and love which saves and 
blesses those upon whom it lays hold, — this was what 
he knew who in spite of his lowliness called himself the 
Messiah, and the same must have been felt by those who 
recognised him as the king of Israel anointed of God. 
How Jesus arrived at the consciousness of being the 



142 What is Christianity? 

Messiah we cannot explain, but still there are some 
points connected with the question which can be 
established. An inner event which Jesus experienced 
at his baptism was in the view of the oldest tradition 
the foundation of his Messianic consciousness. It is 
not an experience which is subject to any criticism ; 
still less are we in a position to contradict it. On the 
contrary, there is a strong probability that when he 
made his public appearance he had already settled 
accounts with himself. The evangelists preface their 
account of his public activity with a curious story of a 
temptation. This story assumes that he was already 
conscious of being the Son of God and the one who 
was intrusted with the all-important work for God's 
people, and that he had overcome the temptations 
which this consciousness brought with it. When John 
sent to him from prison to ask : " Art thou he that 
should come, or do we look for another ? '** the answer 
which he sent necessarily led his questioner to under- 
stand that he was the Messiah, but at the same time 
showed him how Jesus conceived the Messianic office. 
Then came the day at Caesarea Philippi, when Peter 
acknowledged him as the expected Messiah, and Jesus 
joyfully confirmed what he said. This was followed 
by the question to the Pharisees, " What think ye of 
Christ ; whose son is he ? "'' — the scene which ended with 
the fresh question : " If David then call him Lord, 
how is he his son ? "' Lastly, there was the entry into 



The Messiah 143 

Jerusalem before the whole people, together with the 
cleansing of the temple ; actions which were equivalent 
to a public declaration that he was the Messiah. But 
his first unequivocal Messianic action was also his last. 
It was followed by the crown of thorns and the cross. 

I have said that it is probable that when Jesus 
made his public appearance he had already settled 
accounts with himself, and was therefore clear about 
his mission as well. By this, however, I do not mean 
that, so far as he himself was concerned, he had 
nothing more to learn in the course of it. Not only 
had he to learn to suffer, and to look forward to the 
cross with confidence in God, but the consciousness of 
his Sonship was now^ for the first time to be brought 
to the test. The knowledge of the " work " which the 
Father had entrusted to him could not be developed 
except by labour and by victory over all opposition. 
What a moment it must have been for him when he 
recognised that he was the one of whom the prophets 
had spoken ; when he saw the whole history of his 
nation from Abraham and Moses downwards in the 
light of his own mission ; when he could no longer 
avoid the conviction that he was the promised Messiah ! 
No longer avoid it ; — for how can we refuse to believe 
that at first he must have felt this knowledge to be a 
terrible burden ? Yet in saying this we have gone too 
far ; and there is nothing more that we can say. But 
in this connexion we can understand that the evangelist 



144 What is Christianity? 

John was right in making Jesus testify over and over 
again : " I have not spoken of myself, but the Father 
which sent me ; he gave me a commandment, what I 
should say, and what I should speak.'*'' And again : 
" For I am not alone, but I and the Father that 
sent me/'' 

But however we may conceive the " Messiah,"'"' it was 
an assumption that was simply necessary if the man who 
felt the inward call was to gain an absolute recog- 
nition within the lines of Jewish religious history — 
the profoundest and maturest history that any nation 
ever possessed, nay, as the future was to show, the 
true religious history for all mankind. The idea for 
the Messiah became the means — in the first instance 
for the devout of his own nation — of effectively setting 
the man who knew that he was the Son of God, and 
was doing the work of God, on the throne of history. 
But when it had accomplished this, its mission was 
exhausted. Jesus was the " Messiah,*''' and was not 
the Messiah ; and he was not the Messiah, because he 
left the idea far behind him ; because he put a meaning 
into it which was too much for it to bear. Although 
the idea may strike us as strange we can still feel 
some of its meaning ; — an idea which captivated a 
whole nation for centuries, and in which it deposited 
all its ideals, cannot be cjuite unintelligible. In the 
prospect of a Messianic period we see once more the 



Christology 145 

old hope of a golden age ; the hope which, when 
moralised, must necessarily be the goal of every 
vigorous movement in human life and forms an in- 
alienable element in the religious view of history ; in 
the expectation of a personal Messiah we see an expres- 
sion of the fact that it is persons who form the saving 
element in history, and that if a union of mankind is 
ever to come about by their deepest forces and highest 
aims being brought into accord, this same mankind 
must agree to acknowledge one lord and master. But 
beyond this there is no other meaning and no other 
value to be attached to the Messianic idea; Jesus 
himself deprived it of them. 

With the recognition of Jesus as the Messiah the 
closest possible connexion was established, for every 
devout Jew, between Jesus' message and his person ; 
for it is in the Messiah's activity that God himself 
comes to His people, and the Messiah who does God's 
work and sits at the right hand of God in the clouds 
of heaven has a right to be worshipped. But what 
attitude did Jesus himself take up towards his Gospel ? 
Does he assume a position in it ? To this question 
there are two answers ; one negative and one positive. 

In those leading features of it which we described in 

the earlier lectures the whole of the Gospel is contained, 

and we must keep it free from the intrusion of any 

alien element : God and the soul, the soul and its God. 

10 



146 What is Christianity? 

There was no doubt in Jesus'* mind that God could be 
found, and had been found, in the law and the prophets. 
" He hath showed thee, O man, what is good ; and what 
doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to 
love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God ? ''' He 
takes the publican in the temple, the widow and her 
mite, the lost son, as his examples ; none of them know 
anything about " Christology,'"* and yet by his humility 
the publican was justified. These ai^e facts which 
cannot be turned and twisted without doing violence to 
the grandeur and simplicity of Jesus' message in one 
of its most important aspects. To contend that Jesus 
meant his whole message to be taken provisionally, and 
everything in it to receive a different interpretation 
after his death and resurrection, nay, parts of it to be 
put aside as of no account, is a desperate supposition. 
No ! his message is simpler than the churches would like 
to think it ; simpler, but for that very reason sterner 
and endowed with a greater claim to universality. 
A man cannot evade it by the subterfuge of saying that 
as he can make nothing of this " Christology '*' the 
message is not for him. Jesus directed men^^s attention 
to great questions ; he promised them God's grace and 
mercy ; he required them to decide whether they would 
have God or Mammon, an eternal or an earthly life, 
the soul or the body, humility or self-righteousness, 
love or selfishness, the truth or a lie. These questions 
embrace the whole sphere of existence ; the individual 



Christology 147 

is called upon to listen to the glad message of mercy 
and the Fatherhood of God, and to make up his mind 
whether he will be on God's side and the EternaPs, or on 
the side of the world and of time. The Gospel^ as Jesus 
proclaimed it^ has to do with the Father only and not 
loith the Son, This is no paradox, nor, on the other 
hand, is it " rationalism,"' but the simple expression of 
the actual fact as the evangelists give it. 

But no one has ever yet known the Father in the 
way in which Jesus knows Him, and this knowledge 
of Him he brings to other men, and thereby does " the 
many"" an incomparable service. He leads them to 
God, not only by what he says, but still more by what 
he is and does, and ultimately by what he suffers. It 
was in this sense that he spoke the words, " Come unto 
me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will 
give you rest '"* ; as also, " The Son of man came not to 
be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life 
a ransom for many.'** He knows that through him a 
new epoch is beginning, in which, by their knowledge of 
God, the " least " shall be greater than the greatest of 
the ages before ; he knows that in him thousands — the 
very individuals who are weary and heavy laden — will 
find the Father and gain life ; he knows that he is the 
sower who is scattering good seed ; his is the field, his 
the seed, his the fruit. These things involve no dogmatic 
doctrines ; still less any transformation of the Gospel 
itself, or any oppressive demands upon our faith. They 



148 What is Christianity? 

are the expression of an actual fact which he perceives 
to be aheady happening, and which, with prophetic 
assurance, he beholds in advance. When under the 
terrible burden of his calling and in the midst of the 
struggle, he comes to see that it is through him that 
the blind see, the lame walk, the deaf hear, the poor 
have the Gospel preached to them, he begins to com- 
prehend the glory which the Father has given him, 
and he sees that what he now suffers in his person 
will, through his life crowned in death, remain a fact 
efficacious and of critical importance for all time : He is 
the way to the Father^ and as he is the appointed of the 
Father^ so he is thejitdge as well. 

Was he mistaken ? Neither his immediate posterity, 
nor the course of subsequent history, has decided 
against him. It is not as a mere factor that he is 
connected with the Gospel ; he ivas its personal realisa- 
tion and its strength^ and this he is felt to be still. Fire 
is kindled only by fire ; personal life only by personal 
forces. Let us rid ourselves of all dogmatic sophistry, 
and leave others to pass verdicts of exclusion. The 
Gospel nowhere says that God's mercy is limited to 
Jesus' mission. But history shows us that he is the 
one who brings the weary and heavy laden to God ; 
and, again, that he it was who raised mankind to the 
new level ; and his teaching is still the touchstone, 
in that it brings men to bliss and brings them to 
judgment. 



The Creed 149 

The sentence " I am the Son of God *" was not 
inserted in the Gospel by Jesus himself, and to put 
that sentence there side by side with the others is to 
make an addition to the Gospel. But no one who 
accepts the Gospel, and tries to understand him who 
gave it to us, can fail to affirm that here the divine 
appeared in as pure a form as it can appear on earth, 
or to feel that for those who followed him Jesus was 
himself the strength of the Gospel. What they 
experienced, however, and came to know in and through 
him, they have told the world, and their message is 
still a living force. 

(6) The Gospel and doctrine^ or the question of creed. 

We need not dwell long on this question, as on the 
essential points everything that it is necessary to say 
has already been said in the course of our previous 
observations. 

The Gospel is no theoretical system of doctrine or 
philosophy of the universe ; it is doctrine only in so 
far as it proclaims the reality of God the Father. It 
is a glad message assuring us of life eternal, and telling 
us what the things and the forces with which we have 
to do are worth. By treating of life eternal it teaches 
us how to lead our lives aright. It tells us of the 
value of the human soul, of humility, of mercy, of 
purity, of the cross, and of the w orthlessness of worldly 
goods and anxiety for the things of which earthly life 



150 What is Christianity? 

consists ; and it gives the assurance that in spite of 
all the struggle, peace, certainty, and something within 
that can never be destroyed, will be the crown of a 
life rightly led. What else can "the confession of 
a creed"' mean under these conditions but to do the 
will of God, in the certainty that He is the Father 
and the one who will recompense ? Jesus never spoke 
of any other kind of " creed."" Even when he says : 
"Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I 
confess also before my Father which is in heaven,"" he 
is thinking of people doing as he did; he means the 
confession which shows itself in feeling and action. 
How great a departure from what he thought and 
enjoined is involved in putting a " Christological "" 
creed in the forefront of the Gospel, and in teaching 
that before a man can approach it he must learn to 
think rightly about Christ. That is putting the cart 
before the horse. A man can think and teach rightly 
about Christ only if, and in so far as, he has already 
begun to live according to Christ"s Gospel. There is 
no forecourt to his message through which a man must 
pass ; no yoke which he must first of all take upon 
himself. The thoughts and assurances which the 
Gospel provides are the first thing and the last thing, 
and every soul is directly arraigned before them, 

Still less, however, does the Gospel presuppose any 
definite knowledge of nature, or stand in any connexion 
with such knowledge ; not even in a negative sense 



The Creed 151 

can this contention be maintained. It is religion and 
the moral element that are concerned. The Gospel 
puts the living God before us. Here, too, the confession 
of Him in belief in Him and in the fulfilment of His 
will is the sole thing to be confessed; this is what 
Jesus Christ meant. So far as the knowledge is con- 
cerned — and it is vast — which may be based upon this 
belief, it always varies with the measure of a man's 
inner development and subjective intelligence. But 
to possess the Lord of heaven and earth as a Father 
is an experience which nothing else approaches ; and 
it is an experience which the poorest soul can have, 
and to the reality of which he can bear testimony. 

An experience — it is only the religion which a man 
has himself experienced that is to be confessed ; every 
other creed or confession is in Jesus' view hypocritical 
and fatal. If there is no broad " theory of religion ^ to 
be found in the Gospel, still less is there any direction 
that a man is to begin by accepting and confessing any 
ready-made theory. Faith and creed are to proceed 
and grow up out of the all-important act of turning 
from the world and to God, and creed is to be nothing 
but faith reduced to practice. "All men have not 
faith,'' says the apostle Paul, but all men ought to be 
veracious and be on their guard in religion against lip- 
service and light-hearted assent to creeds. " A certain 
man had two sons ; and he came to the first and said, 
Son, go work to-day in my vineyard. He answered 



152 What is Christianity? 

and said, I will not ; but afterward he repented and 
went. And he came to the second, and said likewise. 
And he answered and said, I go, sir ; and went not."'* 

I might stop here, but I am impelled to answer one 
more objection. The Gospel, it is said, is a great and 
sublime thing, and it has certainly been a saving power 
in history, but it is indissolubly connected with an 
antiquated view of the world and history ; and, there- 
fore, although it be painful to say so, and we have 
nothing better to put in its place, it has lost its validity 
and can have no further significance for us. In view of 
this objection there are two things which I should like 
to say : — 

Firstly, no doubt it is true that the view of the world 
and history with which the Gospel is connected is quite 
different from ours, and that view we cannot recall 
to life, and would not if we could ; but " indissoluble '*' 
the connexion is not. I have tried to show what the 
essential elements in the Gospel are, and these elements 
are " timeless."' Not only are they so ; but the man to 
whom the Gospel addresses itself is also ''timeless,*" 
that is, it addresses itself to man^ who, in spite of all 
progress and development, never changes in his inmost 
constitution and in his fundamental relations with 
the external world. Since that is so, this Gospel 
remains in force, then, for us too. 

Secondly, the Gospel is based — and this is the all- 



The Gospel 153 

important element in the view which it takes of the 
world and history — upon the antithesis between Spirit 
and flesh, God and the world, good and evil. Now, in 
spite of ardent efforts, thinkers have not yet succeeded 
in elaborating on a monistic basis any theory of ethics 
that is satisfactory and answers to the deepest needs of 
man. Nor will they succeed. In the end, then, it is 
essentially a matter of indifference what name we give 
to the opposition with which every man of ethical feel- 
ing is concerned : God and the world, the Here and the 
Beyond, the visible and the invisible, matter and spirit, 
the life of impulse and the life of freedom, physics and 
ethics. That there is a unity underlying this opposi- 
tion is a conviction which can be gained hy experience ; 
the one realm can be subordinated to the other ; but it 
is only by a struggle that this unity can be attained, 
and when it is attained it takes the form of a problem 
that is infinite and only approximately soluble. It 
cannot be attained by any refinement of a mechanical 
process. It is by self-conquest that a man is freed from 
the tyranny of matter — 

Von der Gewalt die alle Wesen bindet 
Befreit der Mensch sich der sich uherwindet. 

This saying of Goethe's excellently expresses the 
truth that is here in question. It is a truth which 
holds good for all time, and it forms the essential 
j element in the dramatic pictures of contemporary life in 



154 What is Christianity? 

which the Gospel exhibits the antithesis that is to be 
overcome. I do not know how our increased knowledge 
of nature is to hinder us from bearing witness to the 
truth of the creed that " The world passeth away, and 
the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God 
abide th for ever.*" We have to do with a dualism 
which arose we know not how ; but as moral beings we 
are convinced that, as it has been given us in order 
that we may overcome it in ourselves and bring it to 
a unity, so also it goes back to an original unity, and 
will at last find its reconciliation in the great far-off 
event, the realised dominion of the Good. 

Dreams, it may be said ; for what we see before our 
eyes is something very different. No ! not dreams — 
after all it is here that our true life has its root — but 
patchwork certainly, for we are unable to bring our 
knowledge in space and time, together with the contents 
of our inner life, into the unity of a philosophic theory 
of the world. It is only in the peace of God which 
passeth all understanding that this unity dawns upon us. 

But we have already passed beyond the limits of our 
immediate task. We proposed to acquaint ourselves 
with the Gospel in its fundamental features and in its 
most important bearings. I have tried to respond to 
this task ; but the last point which we touched takes us 
beyond it. We now return to it, in order to follow, in 
the second part of these lectures, the course of the 
Christian religion through history. 



LECTURE IX. 

The task before us in the second half of these lectures 
is to exhibit the history of Christian religion in its 
leading phases, and to examine its development in the 
apostolic age, in Catholicism, and in Protestantism. 

The Christian Religion in the Apostolic Age. 

The inner circle of the disciples, the band of twelve 

whom Jesus had gathered around him, formed itself into 

a community. He himself founded no community in 

the sense of an organised union for divine worship — ^he 

was only the teacher, and the disciples were the pupils ; 

but the fact that the band of pupils at once underwent 

this transformation became the ground upon which all 

subsequent developments rested. What were the 

characteristic features of this society ? Unless I am 

mistaken, there were three factors at work in it : (i.) 

The recognition of Jesus as the living Lord ; (ii.) the fact 

that in every individual member of the new community 

— including the very slaves — religion was an actual 

experience^ and involved the consciousness of a living 

union with God; (iii.) the leading of a holy life in 

155 



156 What is Christianity? 

purity and brotherly fellowship, and the expectation of 
the Chrisfs return in the near future. 

By keeping these three factors in view we can grasp 
the distinctive character of the new community. Let 
us look at them more closely. 

1. Jesus Christ the Lord: in thus confessing their 
belief in him his disciples took the first step in 
continuing their recognition of him as the authoritative 
teacher, of his word as their permanent standard of life, 
of their desire to keep " everything that he commanded 
them."' But this does not express the full meaning 
attaching to the words " the Lord "** ; nay, it is far from 
touching their peculiar significance. The primitive 
community called Jesus its Lord because he had 
sacrificed his life for it, and because its members were 
convinced that he had been raised from the dead and 
was then sitting on the right hand of God. There is 
no historical fact more certain than that the apostle 
Paul was not, as we might perhaps expect, the first to 
emphasise so prominently the significance of Chrisfs 
death and resurrection, but that in recognising their 
meaning he stood exactly on the same ground as the 
primitive community. " I delivered unto you first of 
all,"' he wrote to the Corinthians, "that which I also 
received, how that Christ died for our sins according to 
the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he 
rose again the third day.'' Paul did, it is true, make 
Christ's death and resurrection the subject of a par- 



The Apostolic Age 157 

ticular speculative idea, and, so to speak, reduced the 
whole of the Gospel to these events ; but they were 
already accepted as fundamental facts by the circle of 
Jesus' personal disciples and by the primitive com- 
munity. In these two facts it may be said that the 
permanent recognition of Jesus Christ, and the reverence 
and adoration which he received, obtained their first 
hold. They formed the ground on which the whole 
Christological theory rested. But within two gene- 
rations from his death Jesus Christ was already put 
upon the highest plane upon which men can put him. 
As men were conscious of him as the living Lord, he 
was glorified as the one who had been raised to the 
right hand of God and had vanquished death, as the 
Prince of Life, as the strength of a new existence, as 
the way, the truth, and the life. The Messianic ideas 
permitted of his being placed upon God's throne, 
without endangering monotheism. But, above all, he 
was felt to be the active principle of individual life ; 
" It is not I that live, but Christ that liveth in me '' ; he 
is '^my'" life, and to press onwards to him through 
death is great gain. Where can we find in the history 
of mankind any similar instance of men eating and 
drinking with their master, seeing him in the character- 
istic aspects of his humanity, and then proclaiming him 
not only as the great prophet and revealer of God, but 
as the divine disposer of history, as the " beginning '" of 
God's creation, and as the inner strength of a new life ? 



158 What is Christianity? 

It was not thus that Mahommed's disciples spoke of 
their prophet. Neither is it sufficient to assert that the 
Messianic predicates were simply transferred to Jesus, 
and that everything may be explained by Jesus"* 
expected return in glory throwing its radiance back- 
wards. True, in the certain hope of Jesus'* return, his 
" coming in lowliness ''"' was overlooked ; but that it was 
possible to conceive this certain hope and hold it fast ; 
that in spite of suffering and death it was possible to 
see in him the promised Messiah ; and that in and side 
by side with the vulgar Messianic image of him, men 
felt and opened their hearts to him as the present Lord 
and Saviour, that is what is so astonishing! It was 
just the death "for our sins'*'' and the resurrection that 
confirmed the impression given by his person, and 
provided faith with a sure hold : he died as a sacrifice 
for us and he now lives. 

There are many to-day who have come to regard 
both these positions as very strange, and their attitude 
towards them is one of indifference — towards the death, 
on the ground that no such significance can be attri- 
buted to a single event of this kind ; towards the 
resurrection, because what is here affirmed to have 
happened is incredible. 

It is not our business to defend either the view 
which was taken of the death, or the idea that he had 
risen again ; but it is certainly the historian''s duty to 
make himself so fully acquainted with both positions as 



The Expiatory Sacrifice 159 

to be sensible of the significance which they possessed 
and still possess. That these positions were of capital 
importance for the primitive community has never been 
doubted ; even Strauss did not dispute it ; and the 
great critic Ferdinand Christian Baur acknowledged 
that it was on the belief in them that the earliest 
Christian communion was built up. It must be possible, 
then, for us in our turn to get a feeling and an under- 
standing for what they were ; nay, perhaps w^e may do 
more ; for when we probe the history of religion to the 
bottom, we find the truth and justice of ideas which on 
the surface seem so paradoxical and incredible lying at 
the very roots of the faith. 

Let us first consider the idea that Jesus' death on 
the cross was one of expiation. Now, if we were to 
consider the conception attaching to the words 
"expiatory death"" in the alien realm of formal 
speculation, we should, it is true, soon find ourselves in 
a blind alley, and every chance of our understanding 
the idea would vanish. We should be absolutely at 
the end of our tether if we were to indulge in specula- 
tions as to the necessity which can have compelled God 
to require such a sacrificial death. Here, however, let 
us bear in mind a fact in the history of religion which 
is quite universal. Those who looked upon this death 
as a sacrifice soon ceased to offer God any blood-sacrifice 
at all. The value attaching to such sacrifices had, it is 



i6o What is Christianity? 

true, been in doubt for generations, and had been 
steadily diminishing ; but it was only now that the 
sacrifices disappeared altogether. They did not dis- 
appear immediately or at one stroke — this is a point 
with which we need not concern ourselves here — but 
their disappearance took place within a very brief 
period and was not delayed until after the destruction 
of the temple. Further, wherever the Christian message 
subsequently penetrated, the sacrificial altars were 
deserted and dealers in sacrificial beasts found no 
more purchasers. If there is one thing that is certain 
in the history of religion, it is that the death of Christ 
put an end to all blood-sacrifices. But that they are 
based on a deep religious idea is proved by the extent 
to which they existed among so many nations, and 
they are to be judged, not from the point of view of 
cold and blind rationalism, but from that of vivid 
emotion. If it is obvious that they respond to a 
religious need ; if, further, it is certain that the instinct 
which led to them found its satisfaction and therefore 
its goal in Chrisf^s death ; if, lastly, there was the 
express declaration, as we read in the Epistle to the 
Hebrews, that " by one offering he hath perfected for 
ever them that are sanctified,""* we can no longer feel 
this idea of Christ's sacrifice to be so very strange ; for 
history has decided in its favour, and we are beginning 
to get in touch with it. His death had the value of an 
expiatory sacrifice, for otherwise it would not have had 



The Expiatory Sacrifice i6i 

strength to penetrate into that inner world in which 
the blood-sacrifices originated ; but it was not a 
sacrifice in the same sense as the others, or else it 
could not have put an end to them ; it suppressed 
them by settling accounts with them. Nay, we may 
go further ; the validity of all material sacrifices was 
destroyed by Christ's death. Wherever individual 
Christians or whole Churches have returned to them, it 
has been a relapse : the earliest Christians knew that 
the whole sacrificial system was thenceforth abolished, 
and if they were asked for a reason, they pointed to 
Christ's death. 

In the second place : any one who will look into 
history will find that the sufferings of the pure and 
the just are its saving element; that is to say, that it 
is not words, but deeds, and not deeds only but self- 
sacrificing deeds, and not only self-sacrificing deeds, 
but the surrender of life itself, that forms the turning- 
point in every great advance in history. In this sense 
I believe that, however far we may stand from any 
theories about vicarious sacrifice, there are few of us 
after all who will mistake the truth and inner justice of 
such a description as we read in Isa. liii. : " Surely 
he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.**' 
" Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay 
down his life for his friends " — it is in this light that 
Jesus' death was regarded from the beginning. Wher- 
ever any great deed has been accomplished in history, 

11 



1 62 What is Christianity? 

the finer a man's moral feelings are, the more sensible 
will he be of vicarious suffering ; the more he will 
bring that suffering into relation to himself. Did 
Luther in the monastery strive only for himself? — 
was it not for us all that he inwardly bled when he 
fought with the religion that was handed down to him ? 
But it was by the cross of Jesus Christ that mankind 
gained such an experience of the power of purity and 
love true to death that they can never forget it, and 
that it signifies a new epoch in their history. 

Finally, in the third place : no reflection of the 
"reason,"" no deliberation of the "intelligence," will 
ever be able to expunge from the moral ideas of 
mankind the conviction that injustice and sin deserve 
to be punished, and that everywhere that the just man 
suffers, an atonement is made which puts us to shame 
and purifies us. It is a conviction which is impenetrable, 
for it comes out of those depths in which we feel 
ourselves to be a unity, and out of the w^orld which 
lies behind the world of phenomena. Mocked and 
denied as though it had long perished, this truth is 
indestructibly preserved in the moral experience of 
mankind. These are the ideas which from the 
beginning onwards have been roused by Christ's death, 
and have, as it were, played around it. Other ideas 
have been disengaged — ideas of less importance, yet, 
nevertheless, very efficacious at times — but these are 
the most powerful. They have taken shape in the 



The Expiatory Sacrifice 163 

firm conviction that by his death in suffering he did a 
definitive work ; that he did it " for us/"" Were we to 
attempt to measure and register what he did, as was 
soon attempted, we should fall into dreadful paradoxes ; 
but we can in our turn feel it for ourselves with the 
same freedom with which it was originally felt. If we 
also consider that Jesus himself described his death as 
a service which he was rendering to many, and that 
by a solemn act he instituted a lasting remembrance of 
it — I see no reason to doubt the fact — we can under- 
stand how this death and the shame of the cross were 
bound to take the central place. 

Jesus, however, was proclaimed as "the Lord,"' not 
only because he had died for sinners but because he 
was the risen and the living one. If the resurrection 
meant nothing but that a deceased body of flesh and 
blood came to life again, we should make short work 
of this tradition. But it is not so. The New Testa- 
ment itself distinguishes between the Easter message 
of the empty grave and the appearances of Jesus on 
the one side, and the Easter faith on the other. 
Although the greatest value is attached to that 
message, we are to hold the Easter faith even in its 
absence. The story of Thomas is told for the exclusive 
purpose of impressing upon us that we must hold 
the Easter faith even without the Easter message : 
" Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have 



164 What is Christianity? 

believed."" The disciples on the road to Emmaus 
were blamed for not believing in the resurrection even 
though the Easter message had not yet reached them. 
The Lord is a Spirit, says Paul ; and this carries with 
it the certainty of his resurrection. The Easter 
message tells us of that wonderful event in Joseph of 
Arimathaea'^s garden, which, however, no eye saw ; it 
tells us of the empty grave into which a few women 
and disciples looked ; of the appearance of the Lord in 
a transfigured form — so glorified that his own could 
not immediately recognise him ; it soon begins to tell 
us, too, of what the risen one said and did. The 
reports became more and more complete, and more and 
more confident. But the Yifi^ter faith is the conviction 
that the crucified one gained a victory over death ; 
that God is just and powerful ; that he who is the 
firstborn among many brethren still lives. Paul based 
his Easter faith upon the certainty that "the second 
Adam *" was from heaven, and upon his experience, on 
the way to Damascus, of God revealing His Son to him 
as still alive. God, he said, revealed him "in me"''; 
but this inner revelation was coupled with " a vision '*'' 
overwhelming as vision never was afterwards. Did the 
apostle know of the message about the empty grave.? 
While there are theologians of note who doubt it, I 
think it probable ; but we cannot be quite certain 
about it. Certain it is that what he and the disciples 
regarded as all-important was not the state in which 



The Resurrection 165 

the grave was found, but Chrisfs appearances. But 
who of us can maintain that a clear account of these 
appearances can be constructed out of the stories told 
by Paul and the evangelists ; and if that be impossible, 
and there is no tradition of single events which is 
quite trustworthy, how is the Easter faith to be based 
on them ? Either we must decide to rest our belief on 
a foundation unstable and always exposed to fresh 
doubts, or else we must abandon this foundation 
altogether, and with it the miraculous appeal to our 
senses. But here, too, the images of the faith have 
their roots in truth and reality. Whatever may have 
happened at the grave and in the matter of the 
appearances, one thing is certain : This grave was 
the birthplace of the indestructible belief that death is 
vanquished^ that there is a life eternal. It is useless 
to cite Plato ; it is useless to point to the Persian 
religion, and the ideas and the literature of later 
Judaism. All this would have perished and has 
perished ; but the certainty of the resurrection and of 
a life eternal which is bound up with the grave in 
Joseph's garden has not perished, and on the conviction 
that Jesu^ lives we still base those hopes of citizenship 
in an Eternal City which make our earthly life worth 
living and tolerable. " He delivered them who through 
fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage,'' 
as the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews confesses. 
That is the point. And although there be exceptions 



i66 What is Christianity? 

to its sway^ wherever, despite all the weight of nature, 
there is a strong faith in the infinite value of the soul ; 
wherever death has lost its terrors ; wherever the suffer- 
ings of the present are measured against a future of 
glory, this feeling of life is bound up with the convic- 
tion that Jesus Christ has passed through death, that 
God has awakened him and raised him to life and 
glory. What else can we believe but that the earliest 
disciples also found the ultimate foundation of their 
faith in the living Lord to be the strength which 
had gone out from him ? It was a life never to be 
destroyed which they felt to be going out from him ; 
only for a brief span of time could his death stagger 
them ; the strength of the Lord prevailed over every- 
thing ; God did not give him over to death ; he lives 
as the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. It 
is not by any speculative ideas of philosophy but by 
the vision of Jesus'* life and death and by the feeling 
of his imperishable union with God that mankind, so 
far as it believes in these things, has attained to that 
certainty of eternal life for which it was meant, and 
which it dimly discerns — eternal life in time and beyond 
time. This feeling first established faith in the value 
of personal life. But of every attempt to demonstrate 
the certainty of 'immortality'''' by logical process, we 
may say in the words of the poet : 

Believe nvd venUire : as' for pledges. 
The Gods give iione^ 



The Resurrection 167 

Belief in the living Lord and in a life eternal is the 
act of the freedom which is born of God. 

As the crucified and risen one Jesus was the Lord. 
While this confession of belief in him expressed a 
man's whole relation to him, it also afforded endless 
matter for thought and speculation. This conception 
of the " Lord '" came to embrace the many-sided image 
of the Messiah and all the Old Testament prophecies of 
a similar kind. But as yet no ecclesiastical '' doctrines **"* 
about him had been elaborated ; everyone who acknow- 
ledged him as the Lord belonged to the community. 

2. Religion as an actual experience, — The second 
characteristic feature of the primitive community is 
that every individual in it, even the very slaves, possess 
a living experience of God. This is sufficiently 
remarkable ; for at first sight we might think that all 
this devotion to Christ, and this unconditional reverence 
for him, must necessarily have resulted in all religion 
becoming a punctilious subjection to his words, and so 
a kind of voluntary servitude. But the Pauline epistles 
and the Acts of the Apostles give us quite a different 
picture. While they do, indeed, attest the fact that 
Jesus'* words were held in unqualified reverence, this 
fact is not the most prominent feature in the picture of 
earliest Christendom. What is much more character- 
istic is that individual Christians, moved by the Spirit 
of God, are placed in a living and entirely personal 



i68 What is Christianity? 

relation to God Himself. Dr. Weinel has lately 
presented us with a fine book on the Workings of the 
Spirit and the Spirits in the Post-apostolic Age, It 
contains many passages which take us back to the 
apostolic age and treat in greater detail of the matters 
which Professor Gunkel has so impressively placed 
before us in his treatise on The Holy Ghost, The 
neglected problems of the extent to which, and the 
forms in which, the Spirit exercised an influence on the 
life of the early Christians, and of the view to be taken 
of the phenomena connected with this influence, are 
admirably discussed by Dr. Weinel. In substance, his 
conclusion is that the expressions " receiving "'' and 
" acting by '*' the Holy Ghost signify such an inde- 
pendence and immediacy of religious life and feeling, 
and such an inner union with God, perceived to be the 
mightiest reality, as could not have been expected from 
strict subjection to Jesus' authority. To be the child 
of God and to be gifted with the Spirit are simply the 
same as being a disciple of Christ. That a man is not 
truly a disciple unless he is pervaded by God's Spirit 
is a point which the Acts of the Apostles fully 
recognises. The pouring out of the Holy Spirit is 
placed in the forefront of the narrative. The author 
is conscious that the Christian religion would not be 
the highest and the ultimate religion, unless it brought 
every individual into an immediate and living connexion 
with God. This umtual union of a full obedient 



The Holy Ghost 169 

subjection to the I^ord with freedom in the Spirit is 
the most important feature in the distinctive character 
of this religion and the seal of its greatness. The 
workings of the Spirit were shown everywhere, in the 
entire domain of the five senses, in the sphere of will 
and action, in profound philosophical speculation, and 
in the most delicate appreciation of the facts of the 
moral life. The elementary forces of the religious 
temperament, long held in check by systems of doctrine 
and the ceremonies of public worship, were again set 
free. They showed themselves in ecstatic phenomena, 
in signs and wonders, in an enhancement of all the 
functions of life, down to conditions of a pathological 
and suspicious character. The fact, however, was not 
forgotten — and where it threatened to be obscured it 
was strongly impressed on people's attention — that 
those strange and violent phenomena were individual, 
but that side by side with them there are workings of 
the Spirit which are bestowed upon every one and with 
which no one can dispense. But "' The fruit of the 
Spirit,''^ as the apostle Paul writes, "is love, joy, peace, 
longsufFering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, 
temperance."" The other feature in the distinctive 
character and greatness of this religion is that it does 
not overestimate the elementary strength which gave 
it birth ; that it makes its spiritual purport and its 
discipline triumph over all states of ecstasy ; and that 
it holds immovably to its conviction that the Spirit 



lyo What is Christianity? 

of God, however it may reveal itself, is a Spirit of 
holiness and of love. But here we have already 
passed to the third feature which characterises early 
Christendom. 

3. The third feature is the leading of a holy life in 
purity and brotherly fellowship and in the expectation 
of Christ"*s speedy return. The course which the history 
of the Church followed resulted in the dogmatic details 
in the New Testament being selected for investigation, 
rather than those parts of it which depicted the life 
of the first Christians and exhorted men to morality. 
And yet not only are the New Testament epistles largely 
taken up with these moral exhortations, but not a few 
of the so-called dogmatic portions were also written 
solely for moral admonition. Jesus directed his disciples 
to give these exhortations the first place, and the 
earliest Christians were well aware that the first business 
of life was to do the will of God and present themselves 
as a holy community. Upon this their whole existence 
and their mission in the world were based. There were 
two points which, in accordance with Jesus'* teaching, 
they put first and foremost, and they were points which 
at bottom embraced the whole range of moral action : 
piirity and brotherly fellowship. They took purity in 
the deepest and most comprehensive sense of the word, 
as the horror of everything tliat is unholy, and as the 
inner pleasure in everything that is upright and true, 



The Community of Brothers 171 

lovely and of good report. They also meant purity in 
regard to the body : " Know ye not that your body is 
the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you ? there- 
fore glorify God in your body."' In this sublime con- 
sciousness the earliest Christians took up the struggle 
against the sins of impurity, which in the heathen 
world were not accounted sins at all. As sons of God, 
" blameless and harmless in the midst of a crooked and 
perverse nation,^' they were to " shine as lights in the 
world.*' It was thus that they were to show of what 
they were made, and it was thus that they showed it : 
to be holy as God was holy, to be pure as disciples of 
Christ. Here, too, we get the measure of the renuncia- 
tion of the world which this community imposed upon 
itself. " To keep oneself unspotted from the world '"^ was 
the asceticism which it practised itself and required of its 
adherents. The other point is brotherly fellowship. In 
joining the love of God with the love of neighbour in 
his sayings, Jesus himself had a new union of men with 
one another in view. The earliest Christians understood 
him. From the very first they constituted themselves 
into a brotherly union, not in word only but in deed — 
a living realisation of what he meant. In calling them- 
selves " brothers,"" they felt all the obligations which 
the name imposes and tried to come up to them, not by 
legal regulations but by voluntary service, each accord- 
ing to the measure of his own powers and gifts. The 
Acts of the Apostles tell us that in Jerusalem they 



172 What is Christianity? 

went so far as to have a voluntary community of goods. 
Paul says nothing about it ; and if we are to accept this 
obscure report as really trustworthy, then neither Paul 
nor the Christian communities among the Gentiles took 
pattern by the enterprise. They seem not to have 
been required, nor to have thought it desirable, to order 
their lives afresh in externals. The brotherly fellowship 
which " the holy '"^ were to cultivate, and did cultivate, 
was distinguished by two principles : '' Whether one 
member suffer, all the members suffer with it,"' and 
" Bear ye one another's burdens and so fulfil the 
law of Christ." 



LECTURE X. 

It was as their Lord that the primitive community of 
Christians beKeved in Jesus. They thus expressed their 
absolute devotion to and confidence in him as the 
Prince of Life. As every individual Christian stood 
in an immediate relation to God through the Spirit, 
priests and mediations were no longer wanted. Finally, 
these " holy '** people w^ere drawn together into societies, 
which bound themselves to a strictly moral life in purity 
and brotherly fellowship. On the last point let me add 
a few words. 

It is a proof of the inwardness and moral power of the 
new message that in spite of the enthusiasm arising from 
personal experience of religion, there were relatively 
seldom any extravagant outbursts and violent move- 
ments to be combated. Such movements may have 
been more frequent than the direct declarations of our 
authorities allow us to suppose, but they did not form 
the rule ; and when they arose Paul was certainly not 
the only one who was concerned to put them down. 
He had certainly no wish to quench the " Spirit,'' but 

when enthusiasm threatened to lead to a repugnance to 

173 



174 What is Christianity? 

work, as in Thessalonica, or when, as in Corinth, there 
was a superabundance of ecstatic talk, he uttered some 
sober warnings : " If any w^ould not work, neither 
should he eat," and " I had rather speak five words 
with my understanding, that by my voice I might teach 
others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown 
tongue."" Still more plainly are the concentrated repose 
and power of the leaders shown in the moral admoni- 
tions, such as we get not only in the Pauline epistles but 
also, for example, in the first epistle of Peter and in the 
general epistle of James. Christian character is to show 
itself in the essential circumstances of human life, and 
that life is to be invigorated, supported and illumined 
by the Spirit. In the relation of husband to wife and 
of wife to husband, of parents to children, of masters to 
servants ; further, in the individual's relation to con- 
stituted authority, to the surrounding heathen world, 
and, again, to the widow and the orphan, is "the 
service of God ■*' to be proved and tested. Where have 
we another example in history of a religion coming in 
with such a robust supernatural consciousness, and at the 
same time laying the moral foundations of the earthly 
life of the community so firmly as this message ? If a 
man fails to be inwardly affected by the faith proclaimed 
by the New Testament writers, he nmst certainly be 
stirred to the depths by the purity, the wealth, the 
power, and the delicacy of the moral knowledge which 
invests their exhortations with such incomparable value. 



Christ's Return 175 

There is another feature of the Hfe of the earhest 
Christians which also deserves notice in this connexion. 
They Hved in the expectation of Christ's near return. 
This hope supphed them with an extraordinarily strong 
motive for disregarding earthly things and the joys and 
sufferings of this world. That they were mistaken in 
their expectation we must freely grant ; but nevertheless 
it was a highly efficacious lever for raising them above 
the world, and teaching them to make little of small 
things and much of great things, and to distinguish 
between what is of time and what is of eternity. For a 
new and powerful religious impulse, which effects its own 
influence, to be associated with another factor which 
enhances and strengthens that influence, is what we see 
constantly happening in the history of religion. With 
every renewal of the religious experience of sin and 
grace since Augustine's day, what a lever has been 
supplied by the idea of predestination^ and yet it is an 
idea which is in no way derived from that experience itself. 
How much enthusiasm was inspired in Cromw^elFs troops, 
and how greatly were the Puritans on both sides of the 
ocean strengthened by the consciousness of adoption^ 
although this consciousness, too, was only an adjunct. 
When the religious experiences of St. Francis developed 
in the Middle Ages into a new form of devotion, how 
much assistance it received from the doctrine of poverty^ 
and yet this doctrine was an independent force. The 
conviction which obtained in the apostolic age that the 



176 What is Christianity? 

Lord had really appeared after his death on the cross 
may also be regarded in the same light. What we are 
thus taught is that the most inward of all possessions, 
namely, religion, does not struggle up into life free and 
isolated, but grows, so to speak, clothed in bark and 
cannot grow without it. In studying the apostolic age, 
however, it is important to observe that, not only in 
spite of the religious enthusiasm but even in spite of the 
intense eschatological hopes which prevailed, the task 
of making earthly life holy was not neglected. 

The three principles which we have emphasised as 
contributing most to the characteristic features of 
primitive Christianity could also, if necessary, have 
been brought to bear within the framework of Judaism 
and in connexion with the synagogue. There, too, 
Jesus could have been acknowledged as the I^ord, the 
new experience united with the ancestral religion, and 
the society of brothers developed in the form of a 
Jewish conventicle. In Palestine, as a matter of fact, 
this was the form which the earliest communities took. 
But the new principles displayed great vigour and 
pointed far beyond Judaism : Jesus Christ the Lord is 
not only IsraePs I^ord, but the Lord of history, the 
Lord of all men. The new experience of a direct union 
with God makes the old worship with its priests and 
mediations unnecessary. The society of brothers towers 
over all other associations and deprives them of any 



The Dispersion 177 

value. The inner development which the nev^^ tendency 
virtually comprised began at once. Paul was not the first 
to start it ; before and side by side with him there were 
obscure and nameless Christians in the dispersion who 
took up Gentiles into the new society. They did away 
with the particularistic and statutory regulations of the 
law by declaring that these were to be understood in a 
purely spiritual sense and to be interpreted as symbols. 
There was a branch of the Jewish world outside 
Palestine where this declaration had long taken actual 
effect — it is true, on other grounds — and where the 
Jewish religion was being freed from its limitations by 
a process of philosophical interpretation which was 
bringing it to the level of a spiritual religion for the 
whole world. This development may be regarded in 
the light of a preliminary stage in the history of Chris- 
tianity, and was in many respects really so. It was the 
stage on which those nameless Christians entered. It 
was the path upon which a deliverance from historical 
Judaism and its outworn religious ordinances was 
capable of gradual attainment. But one thing is 
certain ; it was not the goal of the movement. So long 
as the words " the former religion is done away with *" 
remained unspoken, there was always a fear that in the 
next generation the old regulations would be brought 
forward again in their literal meaning. How often 
and often in the history of religion has there been 
a tendency to do away with some traditional form of 



1 78 What is Christianity? 

doctrine or ritual which has ceased to satisfy inwardly, 
but to do away with it by giving it a new interpretation. 
The endeavour seems to be succeeding ; the temper and 
the knowledge prevailing at the moment are favourable 
to it — when, lo and behold ! the old meaning suddenly 
comes back again. The actual words of the ritual, of 
the liturgy, of the official doctrine, prove stronger than 
anything else. If a new religious idea cannot manage 
to make a radical breach with the past at the critical 
point — the rest may remain as it is — and procure itself 
a new " body,*" it cannot last ; it disappears again. 
There is no tougher or more conservative fabric than 
a properly constituted religion ; it can only yield to a 
higher phase by being abolished. No permanent effect, 
then, could be expected in the apostolic age from the 
twisting and turning of the law so as to make room for 
the new faith side by side with it, or so as to approxi- 
mate the old religion to that faith. Someone had to 
stand up and say " The old is done away with "" ; he 
had to brand any further pursuit of it as a sin ; he . 
had to show that all things were become new. The 
man who did that was the apostle Paul, and it is in 
having done it that his greatness in the history of the 
world consists. 

Paul is the most luminous personality in the history 
of primitive Christianity, and yet opinions differ widely 
as to his true significance. Only a few years ago we 
had a leading Protestant theologian asserting that 



Paul 1 79 

Paul's rabbinical theology led him to corrupt the 
Christian religion. Others, conversely, have called him 
the real founder of that religion. But in the opinion 
of the great majority of those who have studied him 
the true view is that he was the one who understood the 
master and continued his work. This opinion is borne 
out by the facts. Those who blame him for corrupting 
the Christian religion have never felt a single breath of 
his spirit, and judge him only by mere externals, such 
as clothes and book-learning ; those who extol or 
criticise him as a founder of religion are forced to make 
him bear witness against himself on the main point, 
and acknowledge that the consciousness which bore him 
up and steeled him for his work was illusory and self- 
deceptive. As we cannot want to be wiser than history, 
which knows him only as Christ's missionary, and as 
his own words clearly attest what his aims were and 
what he was, we regard him as Christ's disciple, as the 
apostle who not only worked harder but also accom- 
plished more than all the rest put together. 

It was Paul who delivered the Christian religion 
from Judaism. We shall see how he did that if we 
consider the following points : — 

It was Paul who definitely conceived the Gospel as 
the message of redemption already effected and of 
salvation now present. He preached the crucified and 
risen Christ, who gave us access to God and there- 
with righteousness and peace. 



i8o What is Christianity? 

It was he who confidently regarded the Gospel as a 
new force abolishing the religion of the law. 

It was he who perceived that religion in its new 
phase pertains to the individual and therefore to all 
individuals ; and in this conviction, and with a full 
consciousness of what he was doing, he carried the 
Gospel to the nations of the world and transferred it 
from Judaism to the ground occupied by Greece and 
Rome. Not only are Greeks and Jews to unite on the 
basis of the Gospel, but the Jewish dispensation itself 
is now at an end. That the Gospel was transplanted 
from the East, where in subsequent ages it was never 
able to thrive properly, to the West, is a fact which 
we owe to Paul. 

It was he who placed the Gospel in the great 
category of spirit versus flesh, inner versus outer 
existence, life versus death ; he, born a Jew and 
educated a Pharisee, gave it a language^ so that it 
became intelligible, not only to the Greeks but to 
all men generally, and united with the whole of the 
intellectual capital which had been amassed in 
previous ages. 

These are the factors that go to make the apostle'^s 
greatness in the history of religion. On their inner 
connexion I cannot here enter in any detail. But, in 
regard to the first of them, I may remind you of the 
words of the most important historian of religion in our 
day. Wellhausen declares that " Paul's especial work 



Paul i8i 

was to transform the Gospel of the kingdom into the 
Gospel of Jesus Christ, so that the Gospel is no longer 
the prophecy of the coming of the kingdom, but its 
actual fulfilment by Jesus Christ. In his view, accord- 
ingly, redemption from something in the future has 
become something which has already happened and is 
now present. He lays far more emphasis on faith than 
on hope ; he anticipates the sense of future bliss in 
the present feeling of being God's son ; he vanquishes 
death and already leads the new life on earth. He extols 
the strength which is made perfect in weakness ; the 
grace of God is sufficient for him, and he knows that no 
power, present or future, can take him from His love, 
and that all things work together for good to them 
that love God.'" What knowledge, what confidence, what 
strength, was necessary to tear the new religon from its 
mother earth and plant it in an entirely new one ! 
Islam, originating in Arabia, has remained the Arabian 
religion, no matter where it may have penetrated. 
Buddhism has at all times been at its purest in India, 
but this religion, born in Palestine, and confined by its 
founder to Jewish ground, in only a few years after his 
death was severed from that connexion. Paul put it in 
competition with the Israelitish religion : " Christ is the 
end of law.'' Not only did it bear being thus rooted up 
and transplanted, but it showed that it was meant to 
be transplanted. It gave stay and support to the 
Roman empire and the whole world of Western civilisa- 



1 82 What is Christianity? 

tion. If, as Renan justly observes, anyone had told 
the Roman emperor in the first century that the little 
Jew who had come from Antioch as a missionary was 
his best collaborator, and would put the empire upon a 
stable basis, he would have been regarded as a madman, 
and yet the statement would have been quite true. 
Paul brought new forces to the Roman empire, and 
laid the foundations of Western and Christian civilisation. 
Alexander the Great's work has perished; PauFs has 
remained. But if we praise the man who, without being 
able to appeal to a single word of his master's, under- 
took such a bold venture by the help of the spirit and 
with the letter against him, we must none the less pay 
the meed of honour to those personal disciples of Jesus 
who after a bitter internal struggle ultimately associated 
themselves with Paul's principles. That Peter did so 
we know for certain ; of others we hear that they at 
least acknowledged their validity. It was, indeed, no 
insignificant circumstance that men in whose ears every 
word of their master's was still ringing, and in whose 
recollection the concrete features of his personality were 
still a vivid memory — that these faithful disciples 
should recognise a pronouncement to be true which in 
important points seemed to depart from the original 
message and portended the downfall of the religion of 
Israel. What was kernel here, and what was husk, 
history has itself showed with unmistakable plainness, 
and by the shortest process. Husk were the whole of the 



Paul 183 

Jewish limitations attaching to Jesus' message ; husk 
were also such definite statements as " I am not sent but 
unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel." In the 
strength of Christ's spirit the disciples broke through 
these barriers. It was his personal dssciples — not, as 
we might expect, the second or third generation, when the 
immediate memory of the Lord had already paled — 
who stood the great test. That is the most remarkable 
fact of the apostolic age. 

Without doing violence to the inner and essential 
features of the Gospel — unconditional trust in God as 
the Father of Jesus Christ, confidence in the Lord, 
forgiveness of sins, certainty of eternal life, purity 
and brotherly fellowship — Paul transformed it into the 
universal religion, and laid the ground for the great 
Church. But whilst the original limitations fell away, 
new ones of necessity made their appearance ; and they 
modified the simplicity and the power of a movement 
which was from within. Before concluding our survey 
of the apostolic age, we must direct attention to 
these modifications. 

In the first place : the breach with the synagogue 
and the founding of entirely independent religious com- 
munities had well-marked results. Whilst the idea was 
firmly maintained that the community of Christ, the 
" Chm-ch,'" was something suprasensible and heavenly, 
because it came from within, there was also a conviction 
that the Church took visible shape in every separate 



184 What is Christianity? 

community. As a complete breach had taken place, 
or no connexion been established, with the ancient 
communion, the formation of entirely new societies 
was logically invested with a special signiiScance and 
excited the liveliest interest. In his sayings and 
parables Jesus, careless of all externals, could devote 
himself solely to the all-important point ; but how and 
in what forms the seed would grow was not a question 
which occupied his mind ; he had the people of Israel 
with their historical ordinances before him and was not 
thinking of external changes. But the connexion with 
this people was now severed, and no religious movement 
can remain in a bodiless condition. It must elaborate 
forms for common life and common public worship. 
Such forms, however, cannot be improvised ; some of 
them take shape slowly out of concrete necessities ; 
others are derived from the environment and from 
existing circumstances. It was in this way that the 
" Gentile "'' communities procured themselves an organ- 
ism, a body. The forms which they developed were in 
part independent and gradual, and in part based upon 
the facts with which they had to deal. 

But a special measure of value always attaches to 
forms. By being the means by which the community 
is kept together, the value of that to zchich they minister 
is insensibly transferred to them ; or, at least, there is 
always a danger of this happening. One reason for 
this is that the observance of the forms can always be 



Paul 185 

controlled or enforced, as the case may be ; whilst 
for the inner life there is no control that cannot 
be evaded. 

When the breach with the Jewish national com- 
munion had once taken place, there could be no doubt 
about the necessity for setting up a new community in 
opposition to it. The self-consciousness and strength 
of the Christian movement was displayed in the creation 
of a Church which knew itself to be the true Israel. 
But the founding of churches and "the Church ""* on 
earth brought an entirely new interest into the field ; 
what came from within was joined by something that 
came from without ; law, discipline, regulations for ritual 
and doctrine, were developed, and began to assert a 
position by a logic of their own. The measure of value 
applicable to religion itself no longer remained the 
only measure, and with a hundred invisible threads 
religion was insensibly worked into the net of history. 

In the second place : we have already referred to the 
fact that it was above all in his Christology that PauFs 
significance as a teacher consisted. In his view — we 
see this as well by the way in which he illuminated the 
death on the cross and the resurrection, as by his 
equation, "the Lord is a Spirit'' — the redemption is 
already accomplished and salvation a present power. 
" G od hath reconciled us to himself through Jesus 
Christ " ; " If any man be in Christ, he is a new 
creature '' ; " Who shall separate us from the love 



1 86 What is Christianity? 

of God?"' The absolute character of the Christian 
rehgion is thus made clear. But it may also be observed 
in this connexion that every attempt to formulate a 
theory has a logic of its own and dangers of its own. 
There was one danger which the apostle himself had to 
combat, that of men claiming to be redeemed without 
giving practical proof of the new life. In the case of 
Jesus' sayings no such danger could arise, but PauPs 
formulas were not similarly protected. That men are 
not to rely upon ^' redemption,'"* forgiveness of sin, and 
justification, if the hatred of sin and the imitation of 
Christ be lacking, inevitably became in subsequent ages a 
standing theme with all earnest teachers. Who can fail 
to recognise that the doctrines of " material redemption "" 
have been the occasion of grievous temptations in the 
history of the Church, and for whole generations con- 
cealed the true meaning of religion ? The conception of 
" redemption,"' which cannot be inserted in Jesus' teach- 
ing in this free and easy way at all, became a snare. 
No doubt it is true that Christianity is the religion of 
redemption ; but the conception is a delicate one, and 
can never be taken out of the sphere of personal experi- 
ence and inner reformation. 

But here we are met by a second danger closely 
connected with the first. If redemption is to be 
traced to Christ's person and work, everything would 
seem to depend upon a right understanding of this 
person together with what he accomplished. The 



Paul 187 

formation of a correct theory of and about Christ 
threatens to assume the position of chief importance^ and 
to pervert the majesty aud simplicity of the Gospel, 
Here, again, the danger is of a kind such as cannot 
arise with Jesus' sayings. Even in John we read : 
— " If ye love me, keep my commandments.'" But with 
the way in which Paul defined the theory of religion, the 
danger can certainly arise and did arise. How long 
was it before the Church began to teach that the all- 
important thing was to know how the person of Jesus 
was constituted, what sort of physical nature he had, 
and so on ? Paul himself is far removed from this 
position — "Whoso calleth Christ Lord speaketh by 
the Holy Ghost"' — but the way in which he ordered 
his religious conceptions, as the outcome of his 
speculative ideas, unmistakably exercised an influence 
in a wrong direction. That, however great the attrac- 
tion which his way of ordering them may possess for 
the understanding, it is a perverse proceeding to make 
Christology the fundamental substance of the Gospel, 
is shown by Christ's teaching, which is everywhere 
directed to the all-important point, and summarily 
confronts every man with his God. This does not, 
however, prevent Paul from epitomising the Gospel in 
the message of Christ crucified ; thus exhibiting God's 
power and God's wisdom, and in the love of Christ 
kindling the love of God. There are thousands to-day 
in whom the Christian faith is still propagated in the 



1 88 What is Christianity? 

same manner, namely, through Christ. But to demand 
assent to a series of propositions about Christ^s person 
is a different thing altogether. 

There is, however, another point to be considered 
here. Under the influence of the Messianic dogmas, 
and led by the impression which Christ made, Paul 
became the author of the speculative idea that not 
only was God in Christ, but that Christ himself was 
possessed of a peculiar nature of a heavenly kind. 
With the Jews, this was not a notion that necessarily 
shattered the framework of the Messianic idea; but 
with the Greeks it inevitably set an entirely new theory 
in motion. Christ's appearance in itself, the entrance 
of a divine being into the world, came of necessity to 
rank as the chief fact, as itself the real redemption. 
Paul did not, indeed, himself look upon it in this 
light ; for him the crucial facts are the death on the 
cross and the resurrection, and he regards Chrisfs 
entrance into the world from an ethical point of view 
and as an example for us to follow : " For our sakes 
he became poor"'; he humbled himself and renounced 
the world. But this state of things could not last. 
The appearance in itself could not permanently occupy 
the second place ; it was too large. But when moved 
into the first place it threatened the very existence of 
the Gospel, by drawing away men's thoughts and 
interests in another direction. When we look at the 
history of dogma, who can deny that that was what 



Paul 189 

happened? To what extent it happened we shall see 
in the following lectures. 

In the third place : the new church possessed a sacred 
book, the Old Testament. Although Paul taught 
that the law had become of no avail, he found a means 
of preserving the whole of the Old Testament. What 
a blessing to the Church this book has proved ! As 
a book of edification, of consolation, of wisdom, of 
counsel, as a book of history, what an incomparable 
importance it has had for Christian life and apologetics ! 
Which of the religions that Christianity encountered 
on Greek or Roman ground could boast of a similar 
book ? Yet the possession of this book has not been 
an unqualified advantage to the Church. To begin 
with, there are m.any of its pages which exhibit a 
religion and a morality other than Christian. No 
matter how determined people were to spiritualise it 
and give it an inner meaning by construing it in some 
special way, their efforts did not avail to get rid of the 
original sense in its entirety. There was always a 
danger of an inferior and obsolete principle forcing its 
way into Christianity through the Old Testament. 
This, indeed, was what actually occurred. Nor was it 
only in individual aspects that it occurred ; the whole 
aim was changed. Moreover, on the new ground 
religion was intimately connected with a political 
power, namely, with nationality. How if people were 
seduced into again seeking such a connexion, not, 



IQO What is Christianity? 

indeed, with Judaism, but with a new nation, and 
not with ancient national laws, but with something 
of an analogous character ? And when even a Paul 
here and there declared Old Testament laws to be 
still authoritative in spite of their having undergone 
an allegorical transformation, how could anyone 
restrain his successors from also proclaiming other 
laws, remodelled to suit the circumstances of the time, 
as valid ordinances of God? This brings us to the 
second point. Although whatever was drawn from 
the Old Testament by way of authoritative precept 
may have been inoffensive in substance, it was a 
menace to Christian freedom of both kinds. It 
threatened the freedom which comes from within, and 
also the freedom to form church communities and to 
arrange for public worship and discipline. 

I have tried to show that the limitations which 
surrounded the Gospel did not cease with the severance 
of the tie binding it to Judaism, but that, on the 
contrary, new obstacles made their appearance. They 
arose^ hozoever^ just at the very points upon zohich the 
necessary progress of things depended^ or^ as the ca^e 
might be^ zchere an inalienable possession like the Old 
Testament was in question. Here, again, then, we are 
reminded of the fact that, so far as history is concerned, 
as soon as we leave the sphere of pure inwardness, 
there is no progress, no achievement, no advantage of 



Paul 191 

any sort, that has not its dark side, and does not 
bring its disadvantages with it. The apostle Paul 
complained that "we know in part."" To a much 
greater degree is the same thing true of our actions 
and of everything connected with them. We have 
always to "pay the penalty'" of acting, and not only 
take the evil consequences but also knowingly and 
with open eyes deliberately neglect one thing in order 
to gain another. Our purest and most sacred posses- 
sions, when they leave the inward realm and pass into 
the world of form and circumstance, are no exception 
to the rule that the very shape which they take in 
action also proves to be their limitation. 

When the great apostle ended his life under Nero'^s 
axe in the year 64, he could say of himself what a 
short time before he had written to a faithful comrade : 
" I have finished my course ; I have kept the faith.*'*' 
What missionary is there, what preacher, what man 
entrusted with the cure of souls, who can be compared 
with him, whether in the greatness of the task which 
he accomplished, or in the holy energy with which he 
carried it out? He worked with the most living of 
all messages, and kindled a fire; he cared for his 
people like a father and strove for the souls of others 
with all the forces of his own ; at the same time he 
discharged the duties of the teacher, the schoolmaster, 
the organiser. When he sealed his work by his death, 



192 What is Christianity? 

the Roman empire from Antioch as far as Rome, nay, 
as far as Spain, was planted with Christian communities. 
There were to be found in them few that were " mighty 
after the flesh *''* or of noble degree, and yet they were 
as " lights in the world,"**" and on them the progress of 
the world's history rested. They had little " illumina- 
tion,"*' but they had acquired the faith in the living 
God and in a life eternal ; they knew that the value 
of the human soul is infinite, and that its value is 
determined by relation to the invisible ; they led a 
life of purity and brotherly fellowship, or at least 
strove after such a life. Bound together into a new 
people in Jesus Christ, their head, they were filled with 
the high consciousness that Jews and Greeks, Greeks 
and barbarians, would through them become one, and 
that the last and highest stage in the history of 
humanity had been reached. 



LECTURE XL 

The apostolic age now lies behind us. We have seen 
that in the coiu-se of it the Gospel was detached from 
the mother-soil of Judaism and placed upon the broad 
field of the Graeco-Roman empire. The apostle Paul 
was the chief agent in accomplishing this work, and 
in thereby giving Christianity its place in the history 
of the world. The new connexion which it thus 
received did not in itself denote any restricted activity ; 
on the contrary, the Christian religion was intended to 
be realised in mankind, and mankind at that time 
meant the orbis Romanus, But the new connexion 
involved the development of new forms, and new forms 
also meant limitation and encumbrance. We shall see 
more closely how this was effected if we consider 

The Christian Religion in its development 
INTO Catholicism. 

The Gospel did not come into the world as a 

statutory religion, and therefore none of the forms 

in which it assumed intellectual and social expression — 

193 13 



194 What is Christianity? 

not even the earliest — can be regarded as possessing 
a classical and permanent character. The historian 
must always keep this guiding idea before him when 
he undertakes to trace the course of the Christian 
religion through the centuries from the apostolic age 
downwards. As Christianity rises above all antitheses 
of the Here and the Beyond, life and death, work in 
the world and holding aloof from it, reason and 
ecstasy, Hebraism and Hellenism, it can also exist 
under the most diverse conditions; just as it was 
originally amid the wreck of the Jewish religion that 
it developed its power. Not only can it so exist — it 
must do so, if it is to be the religion of the living and 
is itself to live. As a Gospel it has only one aim — the 
finding of the living God, the finding of Him by every 
individual as his God, and as the source of strength 
and joy and peace. How this aim is progressively 
realised through the centuries — whether with the help 
of factors like Hebraism or Hellenism, holding aloof 
from the world or civilising it. Gnosticism or Agnos- 
ticism, ecclesiastical institution or perfectly free union, 
or whatever other kinds of bark there may be which 
protect the core and allow the sap to rise — is a matter 
that is of secondary moment, that is exposed to change, 
that belongs to the centuries, that comes with them 
and with them perishes. 

Now the greatest transformation which the new 
rehgion ever experienced — almost greater even than 



Catholicism 195 

that which gave rise to the Gentile Church and thrust 
the Palestinian communities into the background — falls 
in the second century of our era, and therefore in the 
period which we shall consider in the present lecture. 

If we place ourselves at about the year 200, about 
a hundred or a hundred and twenty years after the 
apostolic age — not more than three or four generations 
had gone by since that age came to an end — what 
kind of spectacle does the Christian religion offer? 

We see a great ecclesiastical and political community, 
and side by side with it numerous "sects'*^ calling 
themselves Christian, but denied the name and bitterly 
opposed. That great ecclesiastical and political com- 
munity presents itself as a league of individual 
communities spanning the Empire from end to end. 
Although independent they are all constituted essenti- 
ally alike, and interconnected by one and the same law 
of doctrine, and by fixed rules for the purposes of 
intercommunion. The law of doctrine seems at first 
sight to be of small scope, but all its tenets are of the 
widest significance ; and together they embrace a pro- 
fusion of metaphysical, cosmological, and historical 
problems, give them definite answers, and supply 
particulars of mankind^s development from the creation 
up to its future form of existence. Jesus' injunctions 
for the conduct of life are not included in this law of 
doctrine ; as the " rule of discipline "" they were sharply 
distinguished from the " rule of faith.'' Each church, 



196 What is Christianity? 

however, also presents itself as an institution for public 
worship, where God is honoured in conformity with a 
solemn ritual. The distinction between priests and 
laymen is already a well-marked characteristic of this 
institution ; certain acts of divine worship can be 
performed only by the priest ; his mediation is an 
absolute necessity. It is only by mediation that a man 
can approach God at all, by the mediation of right 
doctrine, right ordinance, and a sacred book. The 
living faith seems to be transformed into a creed to 
be believed ; devotion to Christ, into Christology ; the 
ardent hope for the coming of "the kingdom,*" into 
a doctrine of immortality and deification ; prophecy, 
into technical exegesis and theological learning ; the 
ministers of the Spirit, into clerics ; and brothers, into 
laymen in a state of tutelage ; miracles and miraculous 
cures disappear altogether, or else are priestly devices ; 
fervent prayers become solemn hymns and litanies ; 
the " Spirit "" becomes law and compulsion. At the 
same time individual Christians are in full touch with 
the life of the world, and the burning question is, " In 
how much of this life may I take part without losing 
my position as a Christian ? ^"* This enormous trans- 
formation took place within a hundred and twenty 
years. The first thing which we have to determine is. 
How did that happen ? next. Did the Gospel succeed 
in holding its own amid this change, and how did 
it do so ? 



Catholicism 197 

Before, however, we try to answer these two questions, 
we must call to mind a piece of advice which no 
historian ought ever to neglect. Anyone who wants 
to determine the real value and significance of any 
great phenomenon or mighty product of history must 
first and foremost inquire into the work which it 
accomplished, or, as the case may be, into the problem 
which it solved. As every individual has a right to 
be judged, not by this or that virtue or defect, not 
by his talents or by his frailties, but by what he has 
done, so the great edifices of history, the States and 
the Churches, must be estimated first and foremost, 
we may perhaps say, exclusively, by what they have 
achieved. It is the zcork done that forms the decisive 
test. With any other test we are landed in judgments 
of the vaguest kind, now optimistic, now^ pessimistic, and 
mere historical twaddle. So here, too, in considering 
the Chuixh as developed into Catholicism^ we must first 
of all ask. In what did its work consist ? What problem 
did it solve ? What did it achieve ? I will answer the 
last question first. It achieved two things : it waged 
war with nature- worship, polytheism, and political 
religion, and beat them back with great energy; 
and it exploded the dualistic philosophy of religion. 
Had the Church at the beginning of the third century 
been asked by way of reproach, " How could you so 
far forget your beginnings and to what have you 
come.^'' it might have answered: "Yes, I have 



198 What is Christianity? 

come to this ; I have been obliged to discard much 
and . take up much ; I have had to fight — my body 
is full of scars, and my clothes are covered with dust ; 
but I have won my battles and built my house ; I have 
beaten back polytheism ; I have disabled and almost 
annihilated that monstrous abortion, political religion ; 
I have resisted the enticements of a subtle religious 
philosophy, and victoriously encountered it with God 
the almighty Creator of all things ; lastly, I have reared 
a great building, a fortress with towers and bulwarks, 
where I guard my treasure and protect the weak/*' 
This is the answer which the Church might have given, 
and truthfully given. But, some one may object, it 
was no great achievement to wage war with nature- 
worship and polytheism, and to beat them back ; they 
had already rotted and decayed, and had little strength 
left. The objection does not hold. Many of the forms 
in which that species of religion had taken shape were, 
no doubt, antiquated and approaching extinction, but 
the religion itself, the religion of nature^ was a mighty 
foe. It even still avails to beguile our souls and touch 
our heart-strings with effect, when an inspired prophet 
voices its message ; how much more so then! The 
hymn to the Sun, giving life to all that lives, produced 
a profound and lifelong religious impression even upon 
a Goethe, and made him into a Sun-worshipper. But 
how overpowering it was in the days before science had 
banished the gods from nature. Christianity exploded 



Catholicism 199 

the religion of nature — exploded it not for this or that 
individual ; that was already done — but exploded it in 
the sense that there was now a large and compact 
community refuting nature-worship and polytheism 
by its impressive doctrines, and affording the deeper 
religious temper stay and support. And then political 
religion ! Behind the imperial cult there was the 
whole power of the State, and to come to terms with 
it looked so safe and easy— yet the Church did not 
yield a single inch ; it abolished the imperial system 
of state-idols. It was to place an irremovable land- 
mark between religion and politics, between God and 
Caesar, that the martyrs shed their blood. Lastly, in 
an age that was deeply moved by questions of religious 
philosophy, the Church maintained a firm front against 
all the speculative ideas of Dualism ; and, although 
these ideas often seemed to approximate closely to 
its own position, it passionately met them with the 
monotheistic view. Here, however, the struggle was 
rendered all the harder by the fact that many Christians 
— and just, too, the most prominent and talented — 
made common cause with the enemy, and themselves 
embraced the dualistic theory. The Church stood firm. 
If we recollect that, in spite of these counter- movements 
against the Graeco- Roman spirit, it also managed 
to attach this very spirit to itself — otherwise than 
Judaism, to whose dealings with the Greek world the 
saying may be applied, " You had power to draw but 



200 What is Christianity? 

not to hold me "'"' ; if we recollect, further, that it was 
in the second century that the foundations of the 
whole of the ecclesiastical system prevailing up to 
the present day were laid, we can only be astonished 
at the greatness of the work which was then achieved. 

We now return to the two questions which we 
raised : How was this great transformation accom- 
plished ? and did the Gospel hold its own amid this 
change, or, if so, how? 

There were, if I am not mistaken, three leading 
forces engaged in bringing about this great revolution, 
and effecting the formation of new forms. The first of 
these forces tallies with a universal law in the history 
of religion, for in every religious development we find 
it at work. When the second and third generations 
after the founding of a new religion have passed 
away ; when hundreds, nay thousands, have become its 
adherents, no longer through conversion but by the 
influences of tradition and of birth — despite Ter- 
tullian's saying, fiimt non nascunhir Christiani ; when 
those who have laid hold upon the faith as great spoil 
are joined by crowds of others who wrap it round them 
like an outer garment, a revolution always occurs. 
The religion of strong feeling and of the heart passes 
into the religion of custom and therefore of form and 
of law. A new religion may be instituted with the 
greatest vigour, the utmost enthusiasm, and a tremen- 



Catholicism 201 

dous amount of inner emotion ; it may at the same 
time lay ever so much stress on spiritual freedom — 
where was all this ever more powerfully expressed than 
in PauFs teaching ? — and yet, even though believers be 
forced to be celibates and only adults be received, the 
process of solidifying and codifying the religion is 
bound to follow. Its forms then at once stiffen ; in 
the very process of stiffening they receive for the first 
time a real significance, and new forms are added. Not 
only do they acquire the value of laws and regulations, 
but they come to be insensibly regarded as though 
they contained within them the very substance of 
religion ; nay, as though they were themselves that 
substance. This is the way in which people who do 
not feel religion to be a reality are compelled to regard 
it, for otherwise they would have nothing at all ; and 
this is the way in which those who continue really to 
live in it are compelled to handle it, or else they would 
be unable to exercise any influence upon others. The 
former are not by any means necessarily hypocrites. 
Real religion, of course, is a closed book to them ; its 
most important element has evaporated. But there 
are various points of view from which a man may still 
be able to appreciate religion without living in it. He 
may appreciate it as discharging the functions of 
morality, or of police ; above all, he may appreciate it 
on aesthetic grounds. When the Romanticists re-intro- 
duced Catholicism into Germany and France at the 



202 What is Christianity? 

beginning of the nineteenth century, Chateaubriand, 
more especially, was never tired of singing its praises, 
and fancied that he had all the feelings of a Catholic. 
But an acute critic remarked that Monsieur Chateau- 
briand was mistaken in his feelings ; he thought that 
he was a true Catholic, while as a matter of fact he was 
only standing before the ancient ruin of the Church 
and exclaiming : " How beautiful ! '''' That is one of the 
ways in which a man can appreciate a religion without 
being an inward adherent of it ; but there are many 
others, and amongst them some in which a nearer 
approach is made to its true substance. All of them, 
however, have this much in common, that any actual 
experience of religion is no longer felt, or felt only in 
an uncertain and intermittent way. Conversely, a high 
regard is paid to the outward shows and influences 
connected with it, and they are carefully maintained. 
Whatever finds expression in doctrines, regulations, 
ordinances and forms of public worship comes to be 
treated as the thing itself. This, then, is the first 
force at work in the transformation : the original 
enthusiasm^ in the large sense of the word, evaporates^ 
and the religion of law and form at once arises. 

But not only did an original element evaporate in 
the course of the second century ; another was intro- 
duced. Even had this youthful religion not severed 
the tie which bound it to Judaism, it would have been 
inevitably affected by the spirit and the civilisation of 



Catholicism 203 

that Graeco-Roman world on whose soil it was perma- 
nently settled. But to what a much greater extent 
was it exposed to the influence of this spirit after 
being sharply severed from the Jewish religion and the 
Jewish nation. It hovered bodiless over the earth 
like a being of the air; bodiless and seeking a body. 
The spirit, no doubt, makes to itself its own body, but 
it does so by assimilating what is around it. The 
injluoc of Hellenism^ of the Greek spirit^ and the union 
of the Gospel with it, form the greatest fact in the 
history of the Church in the second century, and 
when the fact was once established as a foundation it 
continued through the following centuries. In the 
influence of Hellenism on the Christian religion three 
stages may be distinguished, and a preliminary stage 
as well. We have already mentioned the preliminary 
stage in a previous lecture. It is to be found in the 
circumstances in which the Gospel arose, and it formed 
a very condition of its appearance. Not until Alex- 
ander the Great had erected an entirely new position 
of affairs, and the barriers separating the nations of 
the East from one another and from Hellenism had 
been destroyed, could Judaism free itself from its 
limitations and start upon its development into a 
religion for the world. The time was ripe when a man 
in the East could also breathe the air of Greece and 
see his spiritual horizon stretch beyond the limits of 
his own nation. Yet we cannot say that the earliest 



204 What is Christianity ? 

Christian writings, let alone the Gospel, show, to any 
considerable extent, the presence of a Greek element. 
If we are to look for it anywhere — apart from certain 
well-marked traces of it in Paul, Luke, and John — it 
must be in the possibility of the new religion appearing 
at all. We cannot enter further upon this question 
here. The first stage of any real influx of definitely 
Greek thought and Greek life is to be fixed at about 
the year 130. It was then that the religious philosophy 
of Greece began to effect an entrance, and it went 
straight to the centre of the new religion. It sought 
to get into inner touch with Christianity, and, con- 
versely, Christianity itself held out a hand to this ally, 
We are speaking of Greek philosophy ; as yet, there is 
no trace of mythology, Greek worship, and so on ; all 
that was taken up into the Church, cautiously and 
under proper safeguards, was the great capital which 
philosophy had amassed since the days of Socrates. A 
century or so later, about the year 220 or 230, the 
second stage begins ; Greek mysteries, and Greek 
civilisation in the whole range of its development, 
exercise their influence on the Church, but not 
mythology and polytheism ; these were still to come. 
Another century, however, had in its turn to elapse 
before Hellenism as a whole and in every phase of 
its development was established in the Church. Safe- 
guards, of course, are not lacking here either, but for 
the most part they consist only in a change of label ; 



Greek Philosophy 205 

the thing itself is taken over without alteration, and in 
the worship of the saints we see a regular Christian 
religion of a lower order arising. We are here con- 
cerned, however, not with the second and third stage, 
but only with that influx of the Greek spirit which was 
marked by the absorption of Greek philosophy and, 
particularly, of Platonism. Who can deny that 
elements here came together which stood in elective 
affinity ? So much depth and delicacy of feeling, so 
much earnestness and dignity, and — above all — so 
strong a monotheistic piety were displayed in the 
religious ethics of the Greeks, acquired as it had been 
by hard toil on a basis of inner experience and meta- 
physical speculation, that the Christian religion could 
not pass this treasure by with indifference. There was 
much in it, indeed, which was defective and repellent ; 
there was no personality visibly embodying its ethics 
as a living power ; it still kept up a strange connection 
with " demon-worship *" and polytheism ; but both as a 
whole and in its individual parts it was felt to contain 
a kindred element, and it was absoibed. 

But besides the Greek ethics there was also a cosmo- 
logical conception which the Church took over at this 
time, and which was destined in a few decades to attain 
a commanding position in its doctrinal system — the 
Logos, Starting from an examination of the world 
and the life within, Greek thought had arrived at the 
conception of an active central idea — by what stages 



2o6 What is Christianity? 

we need not here mention. This central idea repre- 
sented the unity of the supreme principle of the world, 
of thought, and of ethics ; but it also represented, at 
the same time, the divinity itself as a creative and 
active as distinguished from a quiescent power. The 
most important step that was ever taken in the domain 
of Christian doctrine was when the Christian apologists 
at the beginning of the second century drew the 
equation : the Logos = Jesus Christ. Ancient teachers 
before them had also called Christ " the Logos "*' among 
the many predicates which they assigned to him ; nay, 
one of them, John, had already formulated the pro- 
position, "The Logos is Jesus Christ.'^ But with 
John this proposition had not become the basis of 
every speculative idea about Christ ; with him, too, 
" the Logos *" was only a predicate. But now teachers 
came forward who previous to their conversion had 
been adherents of the Platonico- stoical philosophy, 
and with whom the conception " Logos '''' formed an 
inalienable part of a general philosophy of the world. 
They proclaimed that Jesus Christ was the Logos 
incarnate, which had hitherto been revealed only in 
the great effects which it exercised. In the place of 
the entirely unintelligible conception " Messiah,"" an 
intelligible one was acquired at a stroke ; Christology, 
tottering under the exuberance of its own affirmations, 
received a stable basis ; Christ's significance for the 
world was established ; his mysterious relation to God 



The Logos 207 

was explained ; the cosmos, reason, and ethics, were 
comprehended as one. It was, indeed, a marvellous 
formula; and was not the way prepared for it, nay 
hastened, by the speculative ideas about the Messiah 
propounded by Paul and other ancient teachers ? The 
knowledge that the divine in Christ must be conceived 
as the I^ogos opened up a number of problems, and at 
the same time set them definite limits and gave them 
definite directives. Christ's unique character as opposed 
to all rivals appeared to be established in the simplest 
fashion, and yet the conception provided thought with 
so much liberty and free play that Christ could be re- 
garded, as the need might arise, on the one side as opera- 
tive deity itself, and on the other as still the first-born 
among many brethren and as the first created of God. 

What a proof it is of the impression which Christ's 
teaching created that Greek philosophers managed to 
identify him with the Logos ! For the assertion that 
the incarnation of the Logos had taken place in a 
historical personage there had been no preparation. 
No philosophising Jew had ever thought of identifying 
the Messiah with the Logos ; no Philo, for instance, 
ever entertained the idea of such an equation ! It gave 
a metaphysical significance to a historical fact ; it drew 
into the domain of cosmology aud religious philosophy 
a person who had appeared in time and space ; but by so 
distinguishing one person it raised all history to the 
plane of the cosmical movement. 



2o8 What is Christianity? 

The identification of the Logos with Christ was the 
determining factor in the fusion of Greek philosophy 
with the apostoHc inheritance, and led the more 
thoughtful Greeks to adopt the latter. Most of us 
regard this identification as inadmissible, because the 
way in which we conceive the world and ethics does 
not point to the existence of any Logos at all. But 
a man must be blind not to see that for that age the 
appropriate formula for uniting the Christian religion 
with Greek thought was the Logos. Nor is it difficult 
even to-day to attach a valid meaning to the conception. 
An unmixed blessing it has not been. To a much 
larger extent than the earlier speculative ideas about 
Christ it absorbed men''s interest ; it withdrew their 
minds from the simplicity of the Gospel, and in- 
creasingly transformed it into a philosophy of religion. 
The proposition that the Logos had appeared among 
men had an intoxicating effisct, but the enthusiasm and 
transport which it produced in the soul did not lead 
with any certainty to the God whom Jesus Christ 
proclaimed. 

The loss of an original element and the gain of 
a fresh one, namely, the Greek, are insufficient to 
explain the great change which the Christian religion 
experienced in the second century. We must bear in 
mind, thirdly, the gi'eat struggle which that religion 
was then carrying on within its own domain. Parallel 
with the slow influx of the element of Greek philosophy 



Catholicism 209 

experiments were being made all along the line in the 
direction of what may be briefly called " acute Hellen- 
isation."'' While they offer us a most magnificent 
historical spectacle, in the period itself they were a 
terrible danger. More than any before it, the second 
century is the century of religious fusion, of "Theo- 
crasia." The problem was to include Christianity in 
this religious fusion, as one element among others, 
although the chief. The " Hellenism '^ which made 
this endeavour had already attracted to itself all the 
mysteries, all the philosophy of Eastern worship, 
elements the most sublime and the most absurd, and 
by the never-failing aid of philosophical, that is to say, 
of allegorical interpretation, had spun them all into 
a glittering web. It now fell upon — I cannot help so 
expressing it — the Christian religion. It was impressed 
by the sublime character of this religion ; it did 
reverence to Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the world ; 
it offered to give up everything that it possessed — all 
the treasures of its civilisation and its wisdom — to this 
message, if only the message would suffer them to 
stand. As though endowed with the right to rule, the 
message was to make its entry into a ready-made 
theory of the world and religion, and into mysteries 
already prepared for it. What a proof of the impres- 
sion which this message made, and what a temptation ! 
This " Gnosticism " — such is the name which the 

movement has received — strong and active in the 

14 



2IO What is Christianity? 

abundance of its religious experiments, established 
itself under Christ's name, developed a vigorous and 
abiding feeling for many Christian ideas, sought to 
give shape to what was still shapeless, to settle 
accounts with what was externally incomplete, and 
to bring the whole stream of the Christian movement 
into its own channel. The majority of the faithful, 
led by their bishops, so far from yielding to these 
enticements, took up the struggle with them in the 
conviction that they masked a demonic temptation. 
But struggle in this case meant definition, that is to 
say, drawing a sharp line of demarcation around what 
was Christian and declaring everything heathen that 
would not keep within it. The struggle with Gnosticism 
compelled the Church to put its teachings its worship^ 
and its discipline^ into fixed forms and ordinances^ and 
to exclude everyone zvho would not yield them obedience. 
In the conviction that it was everywhere only con- 
serving and honouring what had been handed down, it 
never for a moment doubted that the obedience which 
it demanded was anything more than subjection to the 
divine will itself, and that in the doctrines with which 
it encountered the enemy it was exhibiting the impress 
of religion itself 

If by " Catholic "" we mean the Church of doctrine 
and of law, then the Catholic Church had its origin in 
the struggle with Gnosticism. It had to pay a heavy 
price for the victory which kept that tendency at bay ; 



Catholicism 211 

we may almost say that the vanquished imposed their 
terms upon the victor : Victi victor thus legem dederunt. 
It kept Duahsm and the acute phase of Hellenism at 
bay ; but by becoming a community with a fully worked- 
out scheme of doctrine, and a definite form of public 
worship, it was of necessity compelled to take on forms 
analogous to those which it combated in the Gnostic. 
To encounter our enemy's theses by setting up others 
one by one, is to change over to his ground. How 
much of its original freedom the Church sacrificed ! It 
was now forced to say : You are no Christian, you 
cannot coiAe into any relation with God at all, unless 
you have first of all acknowledged these doctrines, 
yielded obedience to these ordinances, and sought out 
definite forms of mediation. Nor was anyone to think 
a religious experience legitimate that had not been 
sanctioned by sound doctrine and approved by the 
priests. The Church found no other way and no other 
means of maintaining itself against Gnosticism, and 
what was set up as a protection against enemies from 
without became the palladium, nay, the very founda- 
tion, within. This entire development, it is true, 
would probably have taken place apart from the struggle 
in question — the two elements which we first discussed 
would have produced it — but that it took place so 
rapidly and assumed so positive, nay, so Draconian, a 
shape, was due to the fact that the struggle was one in 
which the very existence of the traditional religion was at 



212 What is Christianity? 

stake. The superficial view that the personal ambition 
of certain individuals was at the bottom of the whole 
system of established ordinance and priesthood is 
absolutely untenable. The loss of the original, living 
element is by itself sufficient to explain the phenomena. 
La rnediocrite fonde VautoritL It is the man who knows 
religion only as usage and obedience that creates the 
priest, for the purpose of ridding himself of an essential 
part of the obligations which he feels by loading him 
with them. He also makes ordinances, for the semi- 
religious prefer an ordinance to a Gospel. 

We have endeavoured to indicate the tendencies by 
which the great change was effected. It remains to 
answer the second question : Did the Gospel hold its 
own amid the change, and, if so, how ? That it entered 
upon an entirely new set of circumstances is already 
obvious ; we shall, however, have to study them more 
closely. 



LECTURE XII. 

No one can compare the internal state of Christendom 
at the beginning of the third century with the state 
in which it found itself a hundred and twenty years 
earlier without being moved by conflicting views and 
sentiments. Admiration for the vigorous achievement 
presented in the creation of the Catholic Church, and 
for the energy with which it extended its activity in 
all directions, is balanced by concern at the absence of 
those many elements of freedom and directness, united, 
however, by an inward bond, which the primitive age 
possessed. Although we are compelled gratefully to 
acknowledge that this Church repelled all attempts to 
let the Christian religion simply dissolve into contem- 
porary thought, and protected itself against the acute 
phase of Hellenisation, still we cannot shut our eyes to 
the fact that it had to pay a high price for maintaining 
its position. Let us determine a little more precisely 
what the alteration was which was effected in it, and on 
which we have already touched. 

The first and most prominent change is the way in 

which freedom and independence in matters of religion 

213 



214 What is Christianity? 

is endangered. No one is to feel and count himself 
a Christian, that is to say, a child of God, who has not 
previously subjected his religious knowledge and experi- 
ence to the controlling influence of the Church's 
creed. The " Spirit '" is confined within the narrowest 
limits, and forbidden to work where and as it will. 
Nay, more ; not only is the individual, except in special 
cases, to begin by being a minor and by obeying the 
Church ; he is never to become of full age, that is to 
say, he is never to lose his dependence on doctrine, on 
the priest, on public worship, and on the " book.'*' It 
was then that what we still specifically call the Catholic 
form of godliness, in contrast w ith the Protestant, origi- 
nated. A blow was dealt at the direct and immediate 
element in religion ; and for any individual to restore it 
afresh for himself became a matter of extraordinary 
difficulty. 

Secondly, although the acute phase of Hellenisation 
was avoided, Christendom became more and more 
penetrated by the Greek and philosophical idea that 
true religion is first and foremost "doctrine,*" and 
doctrine, too, that is coextensive with the whole range 
of knowledge. That this faith of "slaves and old 
women'' attracted to itself the entire philosophy of 
God and the world which the Greeks had formed, and 
undertook to recast that philosophy as though it were 
actually of its own substance, and unite it with the 
teaching of Jesus Christ, was certainly a proof of the 



Catholicism 215 

inner power of the Christian religion ; but the process 
involved, as a necessary consequence, a displacement of 
the fundamental religious interest, and the addition of 
an enormous burden. The question, " What must I do 
to be saved ? ^' which in Jesus Christ's and the apostles'* 
day could still receive a very brief answer, now evoked 
a most diffuse one ; and even though a shorter answer 
might still be provided for the laymen, they were in so 
far regarded as deficient, and expected to observe a 
submissive attitude towards the learned. The Chris- 
tian religion had already received that tendency to 
Intellectualism which has clung to it ever since. But 
when thus presented as a huge and complex fabric, as 
a vast and difficult system of doctrine, not only is it 
encumbered, but its earnest character threatens to dis- 
appear. This character depends upon the emotional 
and gladdening element in it being kept directly 
accessible. The Christian religion is assuredly informed 
with the desire to come to terms with all knowledge 
and with intellectual life as a whole ; but when achieve- 
ments in this field — even presuming that they always 
accord with truth and reality — are held to be equally 
binding with the Gospel message, or even to be a 
necessary preliminary to it, mischief is done to the 
cause of religion. This mischief is already unmistakably 
present at the beginning of the third century. 

Thirdly, the Church obtained a special, independent 
value as an institution ; it became a religious power. 



2i6 What is Christianity? 

Originally only a developed form of that community of 
brothers which furnished place and manner for God's 
common worship and a mysterious shadow of the 
heavenly Church, it now became, as an institution^ an 
indispensable factor in religion. People were taught 
that in this institution Christ's Spirit had deposited 
everything that the individual man can need ; that he 
is wholly bound to it, therefore, not only in love but 
also in faith ; that it is there only that the Spirit 
works, and therefore there only that all its gifts of 
grace are to be found. That the individual Christian 
who did not subordinate himself to the ecclesiastical 
institution relapsed, as a rule, into heathenism, and fell 
into false and evil doctrines or an immoral life, was, 
indeed, an actual fact. The effect of this, combined 
with the struggle against the Gnostics, was that the 
institution, together with all its forms and arrange- 
ments, became more and more identified with the 
" bride of Christ,'" " the true Jerusalem,"" and so on, and 
accordingly was even itself proclaimed as the inviolable 
creation of God, and the fixed and unalterable abode of 
the Holy Ghost. Consistently with this, it began to 
announce that all its ordinances were equally sacred. 
How greatly religious liberty was thus encumbered 
I need not show. 

Fourthly and lastly, the Gospel was not proclaimed 
as the glad message with the same vigour in the second 
century as it had beeen in the first. The reasons for 



Catholicism 217 

this are manifold : on the one hand personal experience 
of religion was not felt so strongly as Paul, or as 
the author of the fourth gospel, felt it ; on the other, 
the prevalent eschatological expectations, which those 
teachers had restrained by their more profound teach- 
ing, remained in full sway. Fear and hope are more 
prominent in the Christianity of the second century 
than they are with Paul, and it is only in appearance 
that the former stands nearer to Jesus' sayings ; for, as 
we saw, God's Fatherhood is the main article in Jesus' 
message. But, as Romans viii. proves, the knowledge 
of this truth is just what Paul embodied in his preach- 
ing of the faith. While the element of fear thus 
obtained a larger scope in the Christianity of the second 
century — this scope increased in proportion as the 
original buoyancy died down and conformity to the 
world extended — the ethical element became less free 
and more a matter of law and of rigorous insistence on 
small points. In religion, " rigorism " always forms the 
obverse side of secularity. But as it appeared impossible 
to expect a rigoristic ethics of every one, the distinction 
between a perfect and a sufficient morality already set 
in as an element in the growth of Catholicism. That 
the roots of this distinction go further back is a fact of 
which we need not here take account ; it was only 
towards the end of the second century that the distinc- 
tion became a fatal one. Born of necessity and erected 
into a virtue, it soon grew so important that the 



2i8 What is Christianity? 

existence of Christianity as a Catholic Church came to 
depend upon it. The uniformity of the Christian ideal 
was thereby disturbed and a quantitative view of moral 
achievement suggested which is unknown to the Gospel. 
The Gospel does, no doubt, make a distinction between 
a strong and a weak faith, and greater and smaller 
moral achievements ; but he that is least in the kingdom 
of God may be perfect in his kind. 

These various tendencies together denote the essen- 
tial changes which the Christian religion experienced 
up to the beginning of the third century, and by which 
it was modified. Did the Gospel hold its own in spite 
of them, and how may that be shown ? Well, we can 
cite a whole series of documents, which, so far as 
written words can attest inner and genuinely Christian 
life, bear very clear and impressive testimony that such 
life existed. Martyrdoms like those of Perpetua and 
Felicitas, or letters passing between connnunities, like 
those from Lyons to Asia Minor, exhibit the Christian 
faith and the strength and delicacy of moral sentiment 
with a splendour only paralleled in the days when the 
faith was founded ; while of all that had been done in 
the external development of the Church they make no 
mention whatever. The way to God is found with 
certainty, and the simplicity of the life within does not 
appear to be disturbed or encumbered. Again, let us 
take a writer like the Christian religious philosopher, 
Clement of Alexandria, who flourished about the year 



Catholicism 219 

200. We can still feel from his writings that this 
scholar, although he was absolutely steeped in specu- 
lative ideas, and as a thinker reduced the Christian 
religion to a boundless sea of " doctrines ''*' — a Greek in 
every fibre of his being — won peace and joy from the 
Gospel. He can also express what he won and testify 
of the power of the living God. It is as a new man 
that he appears, one who has pressed on through the 
whole range of philosophy, through authority and 
speculation, through all the externals of religion, to 
the glorious liberty of the children of God. His faith 
in Providence, his faith in Christ, his doctrine of 
freedom, his ethics — everything is expressed in language 
that betrays the Greek, and yet everything is new 
and genuinely Christian. Further, if we compare him 
with a Christian of quite another stamp, namely, his 
contemporary TertuUian, it is easy to show that what 
they have in common in religion is what they have 
learned from the Gospel^ nay^ is the Gospel itself. And 
in reading and studying Tertullian*'s exposition of the 
Lord's Prayer we see that this hot-blooded African, this 
stern foe of heretics, this resolute champion of auctoritas 
and ratio^ this dogmatic advocate, this writer at once 
Churchman and enthusiast, nevertheless possessed a deep 
feeling for the main substance of the Gospel and a good 
knowledge of it as well. In this Old-Catholic Church 
the Gospel, truly, was not as yet stifled ! 

Further, this Church still kept up the all-important 



220 What is Christianity? 

idea that the Christian community must present itself 
as a society of brothers active in work, and it gave 
expression to this idea in a way that puts subsequent 
generations to shame. 

Lastly, there can be no doubt — and while so truth- 
loving a man as Origen confirms the fact for us, heathen 
writers like Lucian also attest it — that the hope of an 
eternal life, the full confidence in Christ, a readiness 
to make sacrifices, and a purity of morals, were still, in 
spite of all frailties — here, too, not lacking — the real 
characteristics of this society. Origen can challenge 
his heathen opponents to compare any community 
whatever with the Christian community, and to say 
where the greater moral excellence lies. This religion 
had, no doubt, already developed a husk and a covering ; 
to penetrate through to it and grasp the kernel had 
become more difficult ; it had also lost much of its 
original life. But the gifts and the tasks which the 
Gospel offered still remained in force, and the fabric 
which the Church had erected around them also served 
many a man as the means by which he attained to the 
thing itself. 

We now pass to the consideration of 

The Christian Religion in Greek Catholicism. 

I must invite you to descend several centuries with 
me and to look at the Greek Church as it is to-day, 



Greek Catholicism 221 

and as it has been preserved, essentially unaltered, for 
more than a thousand years. Between the third and 
the nineteenth century the history of the Eastern 
Church nowhere presents any great breach, and there- 
fore we may permissibly take up our position in the 
present. Here, in turn, we ask the three following 
questions : — 

What did this Greek Catholicism achieve ? 

What are its characteristics 't 

What modifications did the Gospel here undergo, 
and how did it hold its own ? 

What did this Greek Catholicism achieve ? On this 
point two facts may be cited : firstly, in the great 
domain which it embraces, the countries of the Eastern 
part of the Mediterranean and northwards to the Arctic 
Ocean, it made an end of heathenism and polytheism. 
The decisive victory was achieved from the third to the 
sixth century, and so effectually achieved that the gods of 
Greece really perished — perished unwept and unmourned. 
They died, not in any great battle, but from sheer 
exhaustion, and without offering any resistance worth 
mention. I may just point out that before dying they 
transferred a considerable portion of their power to the 
Church's saints. But, what is more important, with the 
death of the gods, Neoplatonism, the last great product 
of Greek philosophy, was also vanquished. The 
religious philosophy of the Church proved the stronger. 
The victory over Hellenism is an achievement of the 



222 What is Christianity? 

Eastern Church on which it still subsists. Secondly, 
this Church managed to effect such a fusion with the 
individual nations which it drew into its bosom that 
religion and church became to them national palladia, 
nay, palladia pure and simple. Go amongst Greeks, 
Russians, Armenians, etc., and you will everywhere find 
that religon and nationality are inseparable, and the one 
element exists only in and alongside of the other. Men 
of these nationalities will, if need be, suffer themselves 
to be cut in pieces for their religion. This is no mere 
consequence of the pressure exercised by the hostile 
power of Mohammedanism ; the Russians are not subject 
to this pressure. Nor is it only — shall I say ? — in the 
Moscow press that we can see what a firm and intimate 
connexion exists between Church and nation in these 
peoples, in spite of " sects '''' which are not wanting here 
either ; to convince ourselves of it we must read — to 
take an instance at random — Tolstoi's Village Tales. 
They bring before the reader a really touching picture 
of the deep influence of the Church with its message of 
the Eternal, of self-sacrifice, of sympathy and fraternity, 
on the national mind. That the clergy stand low in the 
social scale, and frequently encounter contempt, must 
not delude us into supposing that as the representatives 
of the Church they do not occupy an incomparably 
high position. In Eastern Europe the monastic ideal 
is deeply rooted in the national soul. 

But the mention of these two points includes every- 



Greek Catholicism 223 

thing that can be said about the achievements of this 
Church. To add that it has disseminated a certain 
amount of culture would involve pitching our standard of 
culture very low. In comparison with Islam, too, it is 
no longer so successful in doing what it has done in 
the past and still does in regard to polytheism. The 
missions of the Russian Church are still overthrowing 
polytheism even to-day ; but large territories have been 
lost to Islam, and the Church has not recovered them. 
Islam has extended its victories as far as the Adriatic 
and in the direction of Bosnia. It has won over 
numerous Albanian and Slav tribes which were once 
Christian. It shows itself to be at least a match for its 
rival, although we must not forget that in the heart 
of its dominions there are Christian nations who have 
maintained their creed. 

Our second question was. What are the character- 
istics of this Church? The answer is not easy; for 
as it presents itself to the spectator this Church is a 
highly complex structure. The feelings, the supersti- 
tions, the learning, and the devotional philosophy of 
hundreds, nay, of thousands of years, are built into it. 
But, further ; no one can look at this Church from 
outside, with its forms of worship, its solemn ritual, 
the number of its ceremonies, its relics, pictures, priests, 
monks, and the philosophy of its mysteries, and then 
compare it on the one hand with the Church of the 
first century and on the other with the Hellenic cults 



224 What is Christianity? 

in the age of Neoplatonism, without arriving at the 
conclusion that it belongs not to the former but to 
the latter. It takes theform^ not of a Christian prodiict 
in Greek dress^ hut of a Greek product in Christian 
dress. It would have done battle with the Chris- 
tians of the first century just as it did battle with the 
worship of Magna Mater and Zeus Soter. There are 
innumerable features of this Church which are counted 
as sacred as the Gospel, and towards which not even 
a tendency existed in primitive Christianity. The 
same thing may be said in the main of the whole 
performance of its chief religious service, nay, even of 
many of its dogmas : if certain words, like Christ, etc., 
are omitted, there is nothing left to recall the original 
element. In its external form as a whole this Church 
is nothing more than a continuation of the history of 
Greek religion under the alien influence of Christianity, 
parallel to the many other alien influences which have 
affected it. We might also describe it as the natural 
product of the union between Hellenism, itself already 
in a state of Oriental decay, and Christian teaching; 
it is the transformation which history effects in a 
religion by "natural"''' means, and, as was here the 
case, was bound to effect between the third and the 
sixth century. In this sense it is a natural religion. 
The conception admits of a double meaning. It is 
generally understood as an abstract term covering all 
the elementary feelings and processes traceable in every 



Greek Catholicism 225 

religion. Whether there are any such elements, or, on 
the other hand, whether they are sufficiently stable 
and articulate to be followed as a whole, admits, how- 
ever, of a doubt. The conception "natural religion'"* 
may be better applied to the final product of a religion 
as arising when the "naturaP" forces of history have 
ceased playing on it. At bottom these forces are 
everywhere the same, although difFermg in the way 
in which they are displayed. They mould religion 
until it answers their purpose ; not by expelling what 
is sacred, venerable, and so on, but by assigning it the 
place and allowing it the scope which they consider right. 
They immerse everything in a uniform medium, — that 
medium which, like the air, is the first condition of their 
"natural"" existence. In this sense, then, the Greek 
Church is a natural religion ; no prophet, no reformer, 
no genius, has arisen in its history since the third century 
to disturb the ordinary process by which a religion 
becomes naturalised into common history. The process 
attained its completion in the sixth century and asserted 
itself victoriously against heavy assaults in the eighth and 
ninth. The Church has since been at rest, and no further 
essential, nay, not even any unessential, change has taken 
place in the condition which it then reached. Since then, 
apparently, the nations belonging to this Church have 
encountered nothing to make it seem intolerable to them 
and to call for any reform in it. They still continue, 

then, in this " natural "'■' religion of the sixth century. 

15 



226 What is Christianity? 

I have, however, advisedly spoken of the Church in 
its external form. That we cannot arrive at its inner 
condition by simple deduction from its outer is part 
of its complex character. It is not sufficient to observe, 
then, although the observation is correct, that this 
Church fits into the history of Greek religion. It also 
produces effects which from this point of view are not 
easily intelligible. We cannot form a correct estimate 
of it unless we dwell more closely on the factors which 
lend it its character. 

The first factor which we encounter is tradition and 
its observance. The sacred and the divine do not exist 
in a state in which they can act freely — we shall see 
later to what reservations this statement is subject — 
but are put, as it were, into a storehouse, in the form 
of an immense capital. The capital is to provide for 
all demands, and to be coined in the precise way in 
which the Fathers coined it. Here, it is true, we have 
an idea which can be traced to something already 
existing in the primitive age. We read in the Acts of 
the Apostles that " They continued steadfastly in the 
apostles' doctrine.'' But what became of this discipline 
and the obligation to follow it ? Firstly, everything 
was designated " apostolic " which was deposited in 
this Church during the succeeding centuries ; or, rather, 
what the Church felt itself bound to possess in order to 
adapt itself to the historical position in which it was 
placed, it called apostolic, because it fancied that otherwise 



Greek Catholicism 227 

it could not exist, and so it argued that what is necessary 
for the Church'^s existence must be apostoHc. Secondly, 
it has been established as an irrefragable fact that the 
"continuing steadfastly in the apostW doctrine '"^ 
applies, first and foremost, to the punctilious observance 
of all ritual ordinances : the sacred element is bound up 
with text and form. Both are conceived in a thoroughly 
antique way. That the divine is, so to speak, stored 
up as though it were an actual commodity, and that 
the supreme demand which the Deity makes is the 
punctilious observance of a ritual, were ideas that in 
antiquity were perfectly familiar and admitted of no 
doubt. Tradition and ceremony are the conditions 
under which the Holy alone existed and was accessible. 
Obedience, respect, reverence, were the most important 
religious feelings. Whilst they are doubtless inalien- 
able features of religion, it is only as accompaniments 
of an active feeling quite different in its character that 
they possess any value ; and this further presumes that 
the object to which they are directed is a worthy one. 
Traditionalism and the ritualism so closely connected 
with it are prominent characteristics of the Greek 
Church, but this is just what shows how far it has 
departed from the Gospel. 

The second point that fixes the character of this 
Church is the value which it. attaches to orthodoxy^ to 
sound doctrine. It has stated and re-stated its doctrines 
with the greatest precision and often enough made them 



228 What is Christianity? 

a terror to men of a different creed. No one, it claims, 
can be saved who does not possess the correct doctrine ; 
the man who does not possess it is to be expelled and 
must forfeit all his rights ; if he be a fellow-countryman, 
he must be treated as a leper and lose all connexion 
with his nation. This fanaticism, which still flares up 
here and there in the Greek Church even to-day and 
in principle has not been abandoned, is not Greek, 
although a certain inclination towards it was not lacking 
in the ancient Greeks ; still less did it originate in 
Roman law ; it is the result, rather, of an unfortunate 
combination of several factors. When the Roman 
empire became Christian, the hard fight for existence 
which the Church had waged with the Gnostics 
was not yet forgotten ; still less had the Church 
forgotten the last bloody persecutions which the State 
had inflicted upon it in a kind of despair. These 
two circumstances would in themselves be sufficient to 
explain how the Church came to feel that it had a 
right of reprisal, and was at the same time bound to 
suppress heretics. But, in addition, there had now 
appeared in the highest place, since the days of Diocle- 
tian and Constantine, the absolutist conception, derived 
from the East, of the unlimited right and the unlimited 
duty of the ruler in regard to his " subjects." The 
unfortunate factor in the great change was that the 
Roman emperor was at once, and almost in the same 
moment, a Christian emperor and an Oriental despot. 



Greek Catholicism 229 

The more conscientious he was, the more intolerant he 
was bound to be ; for the Deity had committed to his 
care not only men's bodies but their souls as well. 
Thus arose the aggressive and all-devouring orthodoxy 
of State and Church, or, rather, of the State-Church. 
Examples always to hand from the Old Testament 
completed and sanctified the process. 

Intolerance was a new growth in the land of the 
Greeks, and cannot be roundly laid to their charge ; 
but the way in which doctrine developed, namely, as a 
philosophy of God and the world, was due to their 
influence ; and the fact that religion and doctrine were 
directly identified is also a product of the Greek spirit. 
No mere reference to the significance which doctrine 
already possessed in the apostolic age, and to the 
tendencies operating in the direction of bringing it 
into a speculative form, is sufficient to explain the 
change. These are points, rather, as I hope that I 
have shown in the previous lectures, which bear a 
different interpretation. It is in the second century, 
and with the apologists, that Intellectualism com- 
mences ; and, supported by the struggle with the 
Gnostics and by the Alexandrian school of religious 
philosophers in the Church, it managed to prevail. 

But it is not enough to assess the teaching of the 
Greek Church by its formal side alone, and ascertain 
in what way and to what extent it is exhibited, and 
what is the value to be placed upon it. We must 



230 What is Christianity? 

also examine its substance ; for it possesses two features 
which are quite pecuhar to it and separate it from the 
Greek philosophy of religion — the idea of the creation^ 
and the doctrine of the God-Man nature of the Saviour. 
We shall treat of these two elements in our next 
lecture, and, further, of the two other features which, 
side by side with tradition and doctrine, characterise 
the Greek Church ; namely, the form of worship and 
the order of monkhood. 



I 



LECTURE XIII. 

So far we have established the fact that Greek 
Catholicism is characterised as a religion by two 
elements : by traditionalism and by intellectualism. 
According to traditionalism, the reverent preservation 
of the received inheritance, and the defence of it 
against all innovation, is not only an important duty, 
but is itself the practical proof of religion. That is 
an idea quite in harmony with antiquity but foreign 
to the Gospel ; for the Gospel knows absolutely 
nothing of intercourse with God being bound up with 
reverence for tradition itself. But the second element, 
intellectualism, is also of Greek origin. The elabora- 
tion of the Gospel into a vast philosophy of God and 
the world, in which every conceivable kind of material 
is handled ; the conviction that because Christianity is 
the absolute religion it must give information on all 
questions of metaphysics, cosmology, and history ; the 
view of revelation as a countless multitude of doctrines 
and explanations, all equally holy and important — this 
is Greek intellectualism. According to it. Knowledge 

is the highest good, and spirit is spirit only in so far 

231 



232 What is Christianity? 

as it knows ; everything of an aesthetical, ethical, and 
rehgious character must be converted into some form 
of knowledge, which human will and life can then 
follow with safety. The development of the Christian 
faith into an all-embracing theosophy, and the identi- 
fication of faith with theological knowledge, are proofs 
that the Christian religion on Greek soil entered the 
proscribed circle of the native religious philosophy and 
has remained there. 

But in this vast philosophy of God and the world, 
which possesses an absolute value as the " substance of 
what has been revealed "'' and as " orthodox doctrine,'" 
there are two elements which radically distinguish it 
from Greek religious philosophy and invest it with an 
entirely original character. I do not mean the appeal 
which it makes to revelation — for to that the Neo- 
platonists also appealed — but the idea of creation and 
the doctrine of the God-Man nature of the Saviour. 
They traverse the scheme of Greek religious philosophy 
at two critical points, and have therefore always been 
felt to be alien and intolerable by its genuine 
representatives. 

The idea of creation we can deal with in a few words. 
It is undoubtedly an element which is as important as 
it is in thorough keeping with the Gospel. It abolishes 
all interfusion of God and world, and gives expression 
to the power and actuality of the living God. Attempts 
were not wanting, it is true, among Christian thinkers 



Greek Catholicism 233 

on Greek soil — just because they were Greeks — to con- 
ceive the Deity only as the uniform power operating in 
the fabric of the world, as the unity in diversity, and 
as its goal. Traces of this speculative idea are even 
still to be found in the doctrine of the Greek Church ; 
the idea of creation, however, triumphed, and therewith 
Christianity won a real victory. 

The subject of the God- Man nature of the Saviour is 
one on which it is much more difficult to arrive at a 
correct opinion. It is indubitably the central point in 
the whole dogmatic system of the Chuch. It supplied 
the doctrine of the Trinity. In the Greek view these 
two doctrines together make up Christian teaching 
in nuce. When a Father of the Greek Church once 
said, as he did say : " The idea of the God- Man 
nature, the idea of God becoming a man, is what is new 
in the new, nay, is the only new thing under the sun,"*' 
not only did he correctly represent the opinion of all his 
fellow-believers, but he also at the same time strikingly- 
expressed their view that, while sound intelligence and 
earnest reflection yield all the other points of doctrine 
of themselves, this one lies beyond them. The theo- 
logians of the Greek Church are convinced that the only 
real distinction between the Christian creed and natural 
philosophy is that the former embraces the doctrine of the 
God-Man nature^ including the Trinity. Side by side 
with this, the only other doctrine that can at most 
come in question is that of creation. 



234 What is Christianity? 

If that be so, it is of radical importance to obtain a 
correct view of the origin, meaning, and value of this 
doctrine. In its completed form it must look strange 
to anyone who comes to it straight from the evangelists. 
While no study of history can rid us of the impression 
that the whole fabric of ecclesiastical Christology is a 
thing absolutely outside the concrete personality of 
Jesus Christ, there are, however, historical considerations 
which enable us not only to explain its origin, but also 
even to justify, in a certain degree, the way in which 
it took shape. Let us try to get a clear idea of the 
leading points. 

We saw in a previous lecture how it came about that 
the Church teachers selected the conception of the 
Logos in order to define Christ's nature and majesty. 
They found the conception of the " Messiah '' quite 
unintelligible ; it conveyed no meaning to them. As 
conceptions cannot be improvised, they had to choose 
between representing Christ as a deified man, that is 
to say, as a hero, or conceiving his nature after the 
pattern of one of the Greek gods, or identifying it with 
the Logos. The first two possibilities had to be put 
aside, as they were " heathenish,""* or seemed to be so. 
There remained, therefore, the Logos. How well this 
formula served different purposes we have already 
pointed out. Did it not readily admit of being com- 
bined with the conception of the Sonship, without 
leading to any objectional theogonies ? It involved, 



Greek Catholicism 235 

too, no menace to monotheism. But the formula had 
a logic of its own, and this logic led to results which 
were not absolutely free from suspicion. The conception 
of the Logos was susceptible of very varied expression ; 
in spite of its sublime meaning, it could be also so 
conceived as to permit of the bearer of the title not 
being by any means of a truly divine nature but 
possessing one that was only half divine. 

The question as to the more exact definition of the 
nature of the Logos-Christ could not have attained the 
enormous significance which it received in the Church, 
and might have been stilled by various speculative 
answers, if it had not been accompanied by the triumph 
of a very precise idea of the nature of redemption, 
which acted as a peremptory challenge. Among all 
the possible ideas on the subject of redemption — for- 
giveness of sins, release from the power of the demons, 
and so on — that idea came victoriously to the front in 
the Church in the third century which conceived of it 
as redemption from death and therewith as elevation to 
the divine life^ that is to say^ as deification. It is true 
that this conception found a safe starting-point in the 
Gospel, and support in the Pauline theology ; but in 
the form in which it was now developed it was foreign 
to both of them and conceived on Greek lines ; mortality 
is in itself reckoned as the greatest evil^ and as the cause 
of all evil^ while the greatest of blessings is to live for 
ever. What a severely Greek idea this is we can see, 



236 What is Christianity ? 

in the first place, from the fact that redemption from 
death is presented, in a wholly realistic fashion, as a 
pharmacological process — the divine nature has to flow 
in and transform the mortal nature — and, in the second, 
from the way in which eternal life and deification were 
identified. But if actual interference in the constitu- 
tion of human nature and its deification are involved, 
then the redeemer must himself be God and must become 
man. It is only on this condition that so marvellous 
a process can be imagined as actually taking place. 
Word, doctrine, individual deeds, are here of no avail 
— how can life be given to a stone, or a mortal made 
immortal, by preaching at them ? Only when the 
divine itself bodily enters into mortality can mortality 
be transformed. It is not, however, the hero, but God 
Himself alone, who possesses the divine, that is to say, 
eternal life, and so possesses it as to permit of His 
giving it to others. The Logos, then, must be God 
Himself, and He must have actually become man. 
With the satisfying of these two conditions, real, 
natural redemption, that is to say, the deification of 
humanity, is actually effected. These considerations 
enable us to understand the prodigious disputes over 
the nature of the Logos-Christ which filled several 
centuries. They explain why Athanasius strove for 
the formula that the Logos-Christ was of the same 
nature as the Father, as though the existence or non- 
existence of the Christian religion were at stake. They 



Greek Catholicism 237 

show clearly how it was that other teachers in the 
Greek Church regarded any menace to the complete 
unity of the divine and the human in the Redeemer, 
any notion of a merely moral connexion, as a death- 
blow to Christianity. These teachers secured their 
formulas, which for them were anything but scholastic 
conceptions ; nay, they were the statement and establish- 
ment of a matter of fact, in the absence of which the 
Christian religion was as unsatisfactory as any other. 
The doctrines of the identical nature of the three 
persons of the Trinity — how the doctrine of the Holy 
Ghost came about, I need not mention — and of the 
God-Man nature of the Redeemer are in strict accord- 
ance with the distinguishing notion of the redemption 
as a deification of man"'s nature by making him immortal. 
Without the help of the notion those formulas would 
never have been attained ; but they also stand and 
fall with it. They prevailed, however, not because 
they were akin to the ideas of Greek philosophy, 
but because they were contrasted with them. Greek 
philosophy never ventured, and never aspired, to meet, 
in any similar way by " history ''"' and speculative ideas, 
that wish for immortality which it so vividly enter- 
tained. To attribute any such interference with the 
Cosmos to a historical personality and the manner in 
which it appeared, and to ascribe to that personality a 
transformation in what, given once for all, was in a 
state of eternal flux, must necessarily have seemed, to 



238 What is Christianity? 

Greek philosophy, pure mythology and superstition. 
The " only new thing under the sun " must necessarily 
have appeared to it, and did appear, to be the worst 
kind of fable. 

The Greek Church still entertains the conviction 
to-day that in these doctrines it possesses the essence 
of Christianity, regarded at once as a mystery and as 
a mystery that has been revealed. Criticism of this 
contention is not difficult. We must acknowledge that 
those doctrines powerfully contributed to keeping the 
Christian religion from dissolving into Greek religious 
philosophy; further, that they profoundly impress us 
with the absolute character of this religion ; again, 
that they are in actual accordance with the Greek 
notion of redemption ; lastly, that this very notion has 
one of its roots in the Gospel. But beyond this we 
can acknowledge nothing ; nay, it is to be observed (i.) 
that the notion of the redemption as a deification of 
mortal nature is subchristian, hecmuse the moral element 
involved can at best be only tacked on to it ; (ii.) that 
the whole doctrine is inadmissible, because it has 
scarcely any connexion with the Jesus Christ of the 
Gospel, and its formulas do not fit him ; it is, therefore, 
not founded in truth ; and (iii.) that as it is connected 
with the real Christ only by uncertain threads, it leads 
us awA,y from him ; it does not keep his image alive, but, 
on the contrary, demands that this image should be 
apprehended solely in the light of alleged hypotheses about 



Greek Catholicism 239 

M7n expressed in theoretical propositions. That this 
substitution produces no very serious or destructive 
effects is principally owing to the fact that in spite of 
them the Church has not suppressed the Gospels, and 
that their own innate power makes itself felt. It may 
also be conceded that the notion of God having become 
man does not everywhere produce the effect only of 
a bewildering mystery, but, on the contrary, is capable 
of leading to the pure and definite conviction that God 
was in Christ. We may admit, lastly, that the egoistic 
desire for immortal existence will, within the Christian 
sphere, experience a moral purification through the 
longing to live with and in God^ and to remain insepar- 
ably bound to His love. But all these admissions 
cannot do aw^ay wath the palpable fact that in Greek 
dogma we have a fatal connexion established between 
the desire of the ancients for immortal life and the 
Christian message. Nor can anyone deny that this 
connexion, implanted in Greek religious philosophy 
and the intellectualism which characterised it, has led to 
formulas which are incorrect, introduce a supposititious 
Christ in the place of the real one, and, besides, 
encourage the delusion that, if only a man possesses 
the right formula, he has the thing itself. Even though 
the Christological formula were the theologically 
right one — what a departure from the Gospel is involved 
in maintaining that a man can have no relation with 
Jesus Christ, nay, that he is sinning against him and will 



240 What is Christianity? 

be cast out, unless he first of all acknowledges that Christ 
was one person with two natures and two powers of will, 
one of them divine and one human. Such is the demand 
into which intellectualism has developed. Can such a 
system still find a place for the Gospel story of the 
Syrophoenician woman or the centurion at Capernaum ? 

But with traditionalism and intellectualism a further 
element is associated, namely, ritualism. If religion is 
presented as a complex system of traditional doctrine, 
to which the few alone have any real access, the 
majority of believers cannot practise it at all except as 
ritual. Doctrine comes to be administered in stereotyped 
formidas accompanied by symbolic acts. Although no 
inner understanding of it is thus possible, it produces 
the feeling of something mysterious. The very deifica- 
tion which the future is expected to bring, and which 
in itself is something that can neither be described nor 
conceived, is now administered by means of ritual 
acts, as though it were an earnest of what is to come. 
An imaginative mood is excited, and disposes to its 
reception ; and this excitement, when enhanced, is 
its seal. 

Such are the feelings which move the members of the 
Greek Catholic Church. Intercourse with God is 
achieved through the cult of a mystery, and by means 
of hundreds of efficacious formulas small and great, 
signs, pictures, and consecrated acts, which, if punc- 



Greek Catholicism 241 

tiliously and submissively observed, communicate divine 
grace and prepare the Christian for eternal life. Doc- 
trine as such is for the most part something unknown ; 
if it appears at all, it is only in the form of liturgical 
aphorisms. For ninety-nine per cent, of these Chris- 
tians, religion exists only as a ceremonious ritual, in 
which it is externalised. But even for Christians of 
advanced intelligence all these ritual acts are absolutely 
necessary, for it is only in them that doctrine receives 
its correct application and obtains its due result. 

There is no sadder spectacle than this transformation 
of the Christian religion from a worship of God in 
spirit and in truth into a worship of God in signs, 
formulas, and idols. To feel the whole pity of this 
development, we need not descend to such adherents of 
this form of Christendom as are religiously and intel- 
lectually in a state of complete abandonment, like the 
Copts and Abyssinians ; the Syrians, Greeks, and 
Russians are, taken as a whole, only a little better. 
Where, however, can we find in Jesus' message even a 
trace of any injunction that a man is to submit to 
solemn ceremonies as though they were mysterious 
ministrations, to be punctilious in observing a ritual, to 
put up pictures, and to mumble maxims and formulas 
in a prescribed fashion ? It was to destroy this sort o/ 
religion that Jesus Christ siiffered himself to be nailed to 
the cross^ and now we find it re-established under his 

name and authority ! Not only has "- mystagogy '" 

16 



242 What is Christianity? 

stepped into a position side by side with the " mathesis,"" 
that is to say, the doctrine, which called it forth ; but 
the truth is that " doctrine *'*' — be its constitution what 
it may, it is still a spiritual principle — has disappeared, 
and ceremony dominates everything; This is what 
marks the relapse into the ancient form of the lowest 
class of religion. Over the vast area of Greek and 
Oriental Christendom religion has been almost stifled 
by ritualism. It is not that religion has sacrificed one 
of its essential elements. No ! it has entered an entirely 
different plane ; it has descended to the level where 
religion may be described as a cult and nothing but 
a cult. 

Nevertheless, Greek and Oriental Christianity con- 
tains within itself an element which for centuries has 
been capable of offering, and still offers here and there 
to-day, a certain resistance to the combined forces of 
traditionalism, intellectualism, and ritualism — I mean 
monasticism. To the question. Who is in the highest 
sense of the word a Christian ? the Greek Christian 
replies : the monk. The man who practises silence and 
purity, who shuns not only the world but also the 
Church of the world, who avoids not only false doctrine 
but any statement about the true, who fasts, gives 
himself up to contemplation, and steadily waits for 
God's glorious light to dawn upon his gaze, who 
attaches no value to anything but tranquillity and 



Greek Catholicism 243 

meditation on the Eternal, who asks nothing of life but 
death, and in such complete unselfishness and purity 
discovers the fountains of mercy — this is the Christian. 
To him not even the Church or the consecration which 
it bestows is an absolute necessity. For such a man 
the whole system of sanctified secularity has vanished. 
Over and over again in ascetics of this kind has the 
Church numbered in its ranks men of such strength and 
delicacy of religious feeling, so filled with the divine, 
so inwardly active in forming themselves after certain 
features of Christ's image, that we may, indeed, say : 
here there is a living religion, not unworthy of Chrisfs 
name. We Protestants must not take direct offence at 
the form of monasticism. The conditions under which 
our Churches arose have made a harsh and one-sided 
opinion of it a kind of duty. And although for the 
present, and in view of the problems which press on us, 
we may be justified in retaining this opinion, we must 
not summarily apply it to other circumstances. Nothing 
but monasticism could provide a leaven and a coun- 
terpoise in that traditionalistic and ritualistic secular 
Church, such as the Greek Church was and still is. 
Here there was freedom, independence, and vivid 
experience; here the truth that it is only what is 
experienced and comes from within that has any value 
in religion carried the day. 

And yet, the invaluable tension which in this part of 
Christendom existed between the secular Church and 



244 What is Christianity? 

monasticism has unhappily almost disappeared, and of 
the blessings which it imparted there is scarcely a trace 
left. Not only has monasticism become subject to the 
Church and is everywhere bent under its yoke, but the 
secular spirit has in a special degree invaded the 
monasteries. Greek and Oriental monks are now, as a 
rule, the instruments of the lowest and worst functions 
of the Church, of the worship of pictures and relics, of 
the crassest superstition and the most imbecile sorcery. 
Exceptions are not wanting, and it is still to the monks 
that we must pin our hopes of a better future ; but it is 
not easy to see how a Church is to be reformed which, , 
teach what it will, is content with its adherents finding 
the Christian faith in the observance of certain cere- 
monies, and Christian morality in keeping fast-days 
correctly. 

As to our last question : What modifications did the 
Gospel undergo in this Church and how did it hold its 
own ? Well, in the first place, I do not expect to be 
contradicted if I answer that this official ecclesiasticism 
with its priests and its cult, with all its vessels, saints, 
vestments, pictures and amulets, with its ordinances of 
fasting and its festivals, has absolutely nothing to do 
with the religion of Christ. It is the religion of the 
ancient world, tacked on to certain conceptions in the 
Gospel ; or, rather, it is the ancient religion with the 
Gospel absorbed into it. The religious moods which 



Greek Catholicism 245 

are here produced, or which turn towards this kind of 
religion, are, in so far as they can still be called religious 
at all, of a class lower than Christian. But neither 
have its traditionalism and its " orthodoxy "*"* much in 
common with the Gospel ; they, too, were not derived 
from it and cannot be traced back to it. Correct 
doctrine, reverence, obedience, the shudderings of awe, 
may be valuable and edifying things ; they may avail 
to bind and restrain the individual, especially when 
they draw him into the community of a stable society ; 
but they have nothing to do with the Gospel, as long 
as they fail to touch the individual at the point where 
freedom lies, and inner decision for or against God. In 
contrast with this, monasticism, in its resolve to serve 
God by an ascetic and contemplative life, contains an 
incomparably more valuable element, because sayings 
of Cjirist, even though applied in a one-sided and 
limited way, are nevertheless taken as a standard, and 
the possibility of an independent inner life being 
kindled is not so far removed. 

Not so far removed — entirely lacking, thank God, it 
is not, even in the waste shrines of this ecclesiasticism, 
and Christ's sayings sound in the ear of any who visit 
its churches. On the Church as a Church, apparatus 
and all, there is nothing more favourable to be said 
than has been said already ; the best thing about it is 
that it keeps up^ although to a modest extent^ the know- 
ledge of the Gospel. Jesus' words, even though only 



246 What is Christianity? 

mumbled by the priests, take the first place in this 
Church, too, and the quiet mission which they carry 
out continues. Side by side with the magical apparatus 
and the transports of feeling, of which the ceremony is 
only the caput mortuum^ stand Jesus' sayings ; they are 
read in private and in public, and no superstition avails 
to destroy their power. Nor can its fruits be mistaken 
by anyone who will look below the surface. Among 
these Christians, too, priests and laity, there are men 
who have come to know God as the Father of mercy 
and the leader of their lives, and who love Jesus Christ, 
not because they know him as the person with two 
natures, but because a ray of his being has shone from 
the Gospel into their hearts, and this ray has become 
light and warmth to their own lives. And although 
the idea of the fatherly providence of God more readily 
assumes an almost fatalistic form in the East, and pro- 
duces too much quietism, it is certain that here, too, 
it endows men with strength and energy, unselfishness 
and love. I need only refer again to Tolstoi's Village 
Tales^ which I have already quoted. The picture 
which they present is not artificial. But from much 
also that I have myself seen and experienced I can 
testify how even with the Russian peasant or the 
humbler priests, in spite of all the Saint- and picture- 
worship, a power of simple trust in God is to be found, 
a delicacy of moral feeling, and an active brotherly 
love, which does not disclaim its origin in the Gospel. 



Greek Catholicism 247 

Where they exist, however, the entire ceremonial 
service of religion is capable of undergoing a spiritual- 
isation, not by any "symbolical re-interpretation"" — 
that is much too artificial a process — but because, if 
only the soul is touched by the living God at all, 
thought can rise to Him even by the help of an idol. 
But it is truly no accidental circumstance that, in 
so far as any independent religious life is to be found 
among the members of this Church, it at once takes 
shape in trust in God, in humility, in unselfishness and 
mercy, and that Jesus Christ is at the same time laid 
hold of with reverence ; for these are just the indica- 
tions which show us that the Gospel is not as yet 
stifled, and that it is in these religious virtues that it 
has its real substance. 

As a whole and in its structure the system of the 
Oriental Churches is foreign to the Gospel ; it means 
at once a veritable transformation of the Christian 
faith and the depression of religion to a much lower 
level, namely, that of the ancient world. But in its 
monasticism, in so far as this is not entirely subject to 
the secular Church and itself secularised, there is an 
element which reduces the whole ecclesiastical appa- 
ratus to a secondary position, and which opens up the 
possibility of attaining a state of Christian independ- 
ence. Above all, however, by not having suppressed 
the Gospel, but by having kept it accessible, even 



248 What is Christianity? 

though in a meagre fashion, the Church still possesses 
the corrective in its midst. Side by side with the 
Church the Gospel exercises its own influence on in- 
dividuals. This influence, however, takes shape in a 
type of religion exhibiting the very characteristics 
which we have shown to be most distinctive of Jesus' 
message. Thus on the ground occupied by this Church 
the Gospel has not completely perished. Here, too, 
human souls find a dependence on God and a freedom 
in Him, and when they have found these, they speak 
the language which every Christian understands, and 
which goes to every Christian's heart. 



LECTURE XIV. 

The Christian Religion in Roman Catholicism. 

The Roman Church is the most comprehensive and the 
vastest, the most comphcated and yet at the same time 
the most uniform structure which, as far as we know, 
history has produced. All the powers of the human 
mind and soul, and all the elemental forces at mankind's 
disposal, have had a hand in creating it. In its many- 
sided character and severe cohesion Roman Catholicism 
is far in advance of Greek. We ask in turn : — 

What did the Roman Catholic Church achieve ? 

What are its characteristics ? 

What modifications has the Gospel suffered in this 
Church, and now much of it has remained ? 

What did the Roman Catholic Church achieve? 
Well, in the first place, it educated the Romano- 
Germanic nations, and educated them in a sense other 
than that in which the Eastern Church educated the 
Greek, Slavs, and Orientals. However much their 
original nature, or primitive and historical circum- 
stances, may have favoured those nations and helped to 

249 



250 What is Christianity? 

promote their rise, the value of the services which the 
Church rendered is not thereby diminished. It brought 
Christian civihsation to young nations, and brought 
it, not once only, so as to keep them at its first stage 
— no ! it gave them something which was capable of 
exercising a progressive educational influence, and for 
a period of almost a thousand years it itself led the 
advance. Up to the fourteenth century it was a leader 
and a mother ; it supplied the ideas, set the aims, and 
disengaged the forces. Up to the fourteenth century — 
thenceforward, as we may see, those whom it educated 
became independent, and struck out paths which it did 
not indicate, and on which it is neither willing nor able 
to follow them. But even so, however, during the period 
covered by the last six hundred years, it has not fallen 
so far behind as the Greek Church. Except for com- 
paratively brief periods it has proved itself fully a match 
for the whole movement of politics — we in Germany 
know that well enough ! — and even in the movement of 
thought it still has an important share. The time, 
of course, is long past since it was a leader ; on the 
contrary, it is now a drag ; but, in view of the mistaken 
and precipitate elements in modern progress, the drag 
which it supplies is not always the reverse of a blessing. 
In the second place, however, this Church upheld 
the idea of religious and ecclesiastical independence in 
Western Europe in the face of the tendencies, not 
lacking here either, towards State omnipotence in the 



Roman Catholicism 251 

spiritual domain. In the Greek Church, as we saw, 
rehgion has become so intimately allied with nationality 
and the State that, public worship and monasticism 
apart, it has no room left for independent action. On 
Western ground it is otherwise ; the religious element 
and the moral element bound up with it occupy an 
independent sphere and jealously guard it. This we 
owe in the main to the Roman Church. 

These two facts embrace the most important piece 
of work which this Church achieved and in part still 
achieves. We have already indicated the bounds which 
must be set to the first. To the second also a sensible 
limitation attaches, and we shall see what it is as 
we proceed. 

What are the characteristics of the Roman Church ? 
This was our second question. Unless I am mistaken, 
the Church, complicated as it is, may be resolved into 
three chief elements. The first, Catholicism^ it shares 
with the Greek Church. The second is the Latin spirit 
and the Roman World - empire continuing in the 
Roman Church. The third is the spirit and religious 
fervour of St, Augustine, So far as the inner life of 
this Church is religious life and religious thought, it 
follows the standard which St. Augustine authoritatively 
fixed. Not only has he arisen again and again in his 
many successors, but he has awakened and kindled 
numbers of men who, coming forward with independent 



252 What is Christianity? 

religious and theological fervour, are nevertheless spirit 
of his spirit. 

These three features, the Catholic, the Latin in 
the sense of the Roman World -empire, and the 
Augustinian, constitute the peculiar character of the 
Roman Church. 

So far as the first is concerned, you may recognise its 
importance by the fact that the Roman Church to-day 
receives every Greek Christian, nay, at once effects a 
" union *'*' with every Greek ecclesiastical community, 
without more ado, as soon as the Pope is acknowledged 
and submission is made to his apostolic supremacy. 
Any other condition that may be exacted from the 
Greek Christians is of absolutely no moment ; they are 
even allowed to retain divine worship in their mother 
tongue, and married priests. If we consider what a 
" purification "' Protestants have to undergo before they 
can be received into the bosom of the Roman Church, 
the difference is obvious. Now a Church cannot make 
so great a mistake about itself as to omit any essential 
condition in taking up new members, especially if they 
come from another confession. The element which the 
Roman Church shares with the Greek must, then, be 
of significant and critical importance, when it is suffi- 
cient to make union possible on the condition that the 
papal supremacy is recognised. As a matter of fact, 
the main points characteristic of Greek Catholicism are 
all to be found in Roman as well, and are, on occasion. 



Roman Catholicism 253 

just as energetically maintained here as they are there. 
Traditionalism, orthodoxy, and ritualism play just the 
same part here as they do there, so far as "higher 
considerations *" do not step in ; and the same is true 
of monasticism also. 

So far as " higher considerations '''' do not step in — 
here we have already passed to the examination of the 
second element, namely, the Latin spirit in the sense 
of the Roman World-dominion. In the Western half 
of Christendom the Latin spirit, the spirit of Rome, 
very soon effected certain distinct modifications in the 
general Catholic idea. As early as the beginning of 
the third century we see the thought emerging in the 
Latin Fathers that salvation, however effected and 
whatever its nature, is bestowed in the form of a con- 
tract under definite conditions, and only to the extent 
to which they are observed ; it is salus legitima ; in 
fixing these conditions the Deity manifested its mercy 
and indulgence, but it guards their observance all the 
more jealously. Further, the whole contents of revela- 
tion are lex^ the Bible as well as tradition. Again, 
this tradition is attached to a class of officials and to 
their correct succession. The " mysteries,"*' however, 
are " sacraments " ; that is to say, on the one hand 
they are binding acts ; on the other, they contain 
definite gifts of grace in a carefully limited form and 
with a specific application. Again, the discipline of 
penance is a procedure laid down by law and akin to 



254 What is Christianity? 

the process adopted in a civil action or a suit in defence 
of honour. Lastly, the Church is a legal institution ; 
and it is so, not side by side with its function of 
preserving and distributing salvation, but it is a legal 
institution for the sake of this very function. 

But it is in its constitution as a Church that it is 
a legal establishment. We must briefly see how things 
stand in regard to this constitution, as its foundations 
are common to the Eastern and the Western Church. 
When the monarchical episcopate had developed, the 
Church began to approximate its constitution to State 
government. The system of uniting sees under a 
metropolitan who was, as a rule, the bishop of the 
provincial capital, corresponded with the distribution 
of the empire into provinces. Above and beyond this, 
the ecclesiastical constitution in the East was developed 
a step further when it adapted itself to the division of 
the empire introduced by Diocletian, by which large 
groups of provinces were united. Thus arose the con- 
stitution of the patriarchate, which was not, however, 
strictly enforced, and was in part counteracted by 
other considerations. 

In the West no division into patriarchates came 
about ; but, on the other hand, something else hap- 
pened : in the fifth century the Western Roman empire 
perished of internal weakness and through the inroads 
of the barbarians. What was left of what was Roman 
took refuge in the Roman Church — civilisation, law, 



Roman Catholicism 255 

and orthodox faith as opposed to the Arian. The 
barbarian chiefs, however, did not venture to set them- 
selves up as Roman emperors and enter the vacant 
shrine of the imperium ; they founded empires of their 
own in the provinces. In these circumstances the 
Bishop of Rome appeared as the guardian of the past 
and the shield of the future. All over the provinces 
occupied by the barbarians, even in those which had 
previously maintained a defiant independence in the 
face of Rome, bishops and laity looked to him. What- 
ever Roman elements the barbarians and Arians left 
standing in the provinces — and they were not few — - 
were ecclesiasticised and at the same time put under 
the protection of the Bishop of Rome, who was the 
chief person there after the emperor's disappearance. 
But in Rome the episcopal throne was occupied in the 
fifth century by men who understood the signs of the 
times and utilised them to the full. The Roman 
Church in this way privily pushed itself into the place 
of the Roman World-empire^ of which it is the actual 
continuation ; the empire has not perished, but has only 
undergone a transformation. If we assert, and mean 
the assertion to hold good even of the present time, 
that the Roman Church is the old Roman empire 
consecrated by the Gospel, that is no mere "clever 
remark,"** but the recognition of the true state of the 
matter historically, and the most appropriate and 
fruitful way of describing the character of this Church. 



256 What is Christianity? 

It still governs the nations ; its Popes rule like Trajan 
and Marcus Aurelius ; Peter and Paul have taken the 
place of Romulus and Remus ; the bishops and arch- 
bishops, of the proconsuls ; the troops of priests and 
monks correspond to the legions ; the Jesuits, to the 
imperial bodyguard. The continued influence of the 
old empire and its institutions may be traced in detail, 
down to individual legal ordinances, nay, even in the 
very clothes. That is no Church like the Protestant 
communities, or the national Churches of the East ; it 
is a political creation, and as imposing as a AVorld- 
empire, because the continuation of the Roman empire. 
The Pope, who calls himself " King '' and " Pontifex 
Maximus,"** is Caesar'*s successor. The Church, which as 
early as the third and fourth century was entirely filled 
with the Roman spirit, has re-established in itself the 
Roman empire. Nor have patriotic Catholics in 
Rome and Italy in every century from the seventh 
and eighth onwards understood the matter otherwise. 
AVhen Gregory VII. entered upon the struggle with the 
imperial power, this is the way in which an Italian 
prelate fired his ardour : 

Seize the ^first Apostles sword, 

Peter s glowing sword, and smite ! 

Scatter far the savage horde ; 

Break their wild, impetuous might ! 

Let them feel the yoke of yore. 

Let them hear it evermore ! 



Roman Catholicism 257 

What with blood in Marius day^ 
Marius and his soldiers hrave, 

Or by Julius* mighty srvay, 

Romans did their land to save; 

Thou canst do by simple word. 

Great the Chwxh^s holy sword ! 

Rome made great again by thee 
Offers all thy meed oj praise; 

Not for Scipio^s victory 

Did it louder pceans raise, 

Nor entwine the laurel crown 

For a deed of more renown. 

Who is it that is thus addressed, a bishop or a 
Caesar? A Caesar, I imagine, or, rather, a priestly 
Caesar ; it was felt to be so then, and it is still felt to 
be so to-day. It is an Empire that this priestly Caesar 
rules, and to attack it with the armament of dogmatic 
polemics alone is to beat the air. 

I cannot here show what immense results follow 
from the fact that the Catholic Church is the Roman 
empire. Let me mention only a few conclusions which 
the Church itself draws. It is just as essential to this 
Church to exercise governmental power as to proclaim the 
Gospel. The phrase " Christus vincit, Christus regnat, 
Christus triumphat,'" must be understood in a political 
sense. He rules on earth by the fact that his Rome- 
directed Church rules, and rules, too, by law and by 
force ; that is to say, it employs all the means of which 



258 What is Christianity? 

States avail themselves. Accordingly it recognises no 
form of religious fervour which does not first of all 
submit to this papal Church, is approved by it, and 
remains in constant dependence upon it. This Church, 
then, teaches its "subjects"'' to say: "Though I under- 
stand all mysteries, and though I have all faith, and 
though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and 
though I give my body to be burned, and have not 
unity in love which alone floweth from unconditional 
obedience to the Church, it profiteth me nothing.'''* 
Outside the pale of the Church, all faith, all love, all 
the virtues, even martyrdoms, are of no value whatever. 
Naturally ; for even an earthly State appreciates only 
those services which a man has rendered for its sake. 
But here the State identifies itself with the kingdom of 
heaven, in other respects proceeding just like other 
States. From this fact you can yourselves deduce all 
the Church*'s claims ; they follow without difficulty. 
Even the most exorbitant demand appears quite 
natural as soon as you only admit the truth of the 
two leading propositions : " The Roman Church is the 
kingdom of God,"** and " The Church must govern like 
an earthly State."'' It is not to be denied that Christian 
motives have also had a hand in this development — the 
desire to bring the Christian religion into a real 
connexion with life, and to make its influence felt in 
every situation that may arise, as well as anxiety for 
the salvation of individuals and of nations. How 



Roman Catholicism 259 

many earnest Catholic Christians there have been who 
had no other real desire than to establish Christ's rule 
on earth and build up his kingdom ! But while there 
can be no doubt that their intention, and the energy 
with which they put their hands to the work, made 
them superior to the Greeks, there can be as little that 
it is a serious misunderstanding of Christ's and the 
apostles' injunctions to aim at establishing and building 
up the kingdom of God by political means. The only 
forces which this kingdom knows are religious and 
moral forces, and it rests on a basis of freedom. But 
when a Church comes forward with the claims of an 
earthly State, it is bound to make use of all the means 
at the disposal of that State, including, therefore, 
crafty diplomacy and force ; for the earthly State, even 
a State governed by law, must on occasion become 
a State that acts contrary to law. The course of 
development which this Church has followed as an 
earthly State was, then, bound to lead logically to the 
absolute monarchy of the Pope and his infallibility ; 
for in an earthly theocracy infallibility means, at 
bottom, nothing more than full sovereignty means in 
a secular State. That the Church has not shrunk 
from drawing this last conclusion is a proof of the 
extent to which the sacred element in it has become 
secularised. 

That this second element was bound to produce a 
radical change in the characteristic features of Catholi- 



26o What is Christianity? 

cism in Western Europe, in its traditionalism, its 
orthodoxy, its ritualism, and its monasticism, is obvious. 
Traditionalism holds the same position after the change 
as it did before ; but when any element in it has 
become inconvenient, it is dropped and its place taken 
by the papal will. " La tradition, c'est moi,"*** as Pius 
IX. is reported to have said. Further, " sound 
doctrine '*'' is still a leading principle, but, as a matter 
of fact, it can be altered by the ecclesiastical policy of 
the Pope ; subtle distinctions have given many a dogma 
a new meaning. New dogmas, too, are promulgated. 
In many respects doctrine has become more arbitrary, 
and a rigid formula in a matter of dogma may be set 
aside by a contrary injunction in a matter of ethics 
and in the confessional. The hard and fast lines of 
the past can be everywhere relaxed in favour of the 
needs of the present. The same holds good of ritualism, 
as also of monasticism. The extent to which the old 
monasticism has been altered, by no means always to 
its disadvantage alone, and has even in some important 
aspects been transformed into its flat opposite, I cannot 
here show. In its organisation this Church possesses 
a faculty of adapting itself to the course of history 
such as no other Church possesses ; it always remains 
the same old Church, or seems to do so, and is always 
becoming a new one. 



The third element determining the character of 



Roman Catholicism 261 

the spirit prevalent in the Church is opposed to that 
which we have just discussed, and yet has held its own 
side by side with the second : it goes by the names of 
Augustine and Augustinianism. In the fifth century, 
at the very time when the Church was setting itself to 
acquire the inheritance of the Roman empire, it came 
into possession of a religious genius of extraordinary 
depth and power, accepted his ideas and feelings, and 
up to the present day has been unable to get rid of 
them. That the Church became at one and the same 
time Caesarian and Augustinian is the most important 
and marvellous fact in its history. What kind of a 
spirit, however, and what kind of a tendency, did it 
receive from Augustine? 

Well, in the first place, Augustine's theology and his 
religious fervour denote a special resuscitation of the 
Pauline experience and doctrine of sin and grace^ of 
guilt and justification^ of divine predestination and 
human servitude. In the centuries that had elapsed 
since the apostle*'s day this experience and the doctrine 
embodying it had been lost, but Augustine went 
through the same inner experiences as Paul, gave them 
the same sort of expression, and clothed them in definite 
conceptions. There was no question here of mere 
imitation ; the individual differences between the two 
cases are of the utmost importance, especially in the 
way in which the doctrine of justification is conceived. 
With Augustine, it was represented as a constant 



262 What is Christianity? 

process, continuing until love and all the virtues com- 
pletely filled the heart ; but, as with Paul, it is all a 
matter of individual experience and inner life. If you 
read Augustine's Confessions you will acknowledge that 
in spite of all the rhetoric — and rhetoric there is — it 
is the work of a genius who has felt God, the God of 
the Spirit, to be the be-all and the end-all of his life ; 
who thirsts after Him and desires nothing beside Him. 
Further, all the sad and terrible experiences which he had 
had in his own person, all the rupture with himself, all 
the service of transient things, the " crumbling away into 
the world bit by bit,'"* and the egoism for which he had 
to pay in loss of strength and freedom, he reduces to 
the one root, sin ; that is to say, lack of communion 
with God, godlessness. Again, what released him 
from the entanglements of the world, from selfishness 
and inner decay, and gave him strength, freedom, and 
a consciousness of the Eternal, he calls, with Paul, 
grace. With him he feels, too, that grace is wholly 
the work of God, but that it is obtained through and 
by Christ, and possessed as forgiveness of sins and as 
the spirit of love. He is much less free and more beset 
with scruples in his view of sin than the great apostle ; 
and it is this which gives his religious language and 
everything that proceeded from him quite a peculiar 
colour. "Forgetting those things which are behind, 
and reaching forth unto those things which are 
before "" — the apostolic maxim is not Augustine's. 



Roman Catholicism 263 

Consolation for the misery of sin — this is the complexion 
of his entire Christianity. Only rarely was he capable 
of soaring to the sense of the glorious liberty of the 
children of God ; and, where he was so capable, he 
could not testify to it in the same way as Paul. But 
he could express the sense of consolation for the misery 
of sin with a strength of feeling and in words of an 
overwhelming force such as no one before him ever 
displayed ; nay, more : he managed by what he wrote 
to go so straight to the souls of millions, to describe 
so precisely their inner condition, and so impressively 
and overpoweringly to put the consolation before them, 
that what he felt has been felt again and again for 
fifteen hundred years. Up to the very day in which we 
live^ so far as Catholic Christians are concerned^ inward 
and vivid religious fervour^ and the eoopression which it 
takes ^ are in their whole character Augustinian, It is 
by what he felt that they are kindled, and it is his 
thoughts that they think. Nor is it otherwise with 
many Protestants, and those not of the worst kind. 
This juxtaposition of sin and grace, this interconnexion 
of feeling and doctrine, seems to possess an indestruct- 
ible power which no lapse of time is able to touch ; 
this feeling of mixed pain and bliss is an unforgettable 
possession with those who have once experienced it ; 
and even though they may have subsequently eman- 
cipated themselves from religion, it remains for them 
a sacred memory. 



264 What is Christianity? 

The Western Church opened, and was compelled to 
open, its doors to this Augustine at the very moment 
when it was preparing to enter upon its dominion. It 
was defenceless in face of him ; it had so little of 
any real value to offer from its immediate past that 
it weakly capitulated. Thus arose the astonishing 
" complexio oppositorum '' which we see in Western 
Catholicism : the Church of rites, of law, of politics, 
of World-dominion, and the Church in which a highly 
individual, delicate, sublimated sense and doctrine of 
sin and grace is brought into play. The external and 
the internal elements are supposed to unite ! To 
speak frankly, this was impossible from the beginning ; 
internal tension and conflict were bound to arise at 
once ; the history of Western Catholicism is full of it. 
Up to a certain point, however, these antitheses admit 
of being reconciled; they admit of it at least so far 
as the same men are concerned. That is proved by no 
less a person than Augustine himself, who, in addition 
to his other characteristics, was also a staunch Church- 
man ; nay, who in such matters as power and prestige 
promoted the external interests of the Church, and its 
e(juipment as a whole, with the greatest energy. I 
cannot here explain how he managed to accomplish 
this work, but that there could be no lack of internal 
contradictions in it is obvious. Only let us be clear 
about two facts : firstly, that the outward Church is 
more and more forcing the inward Augustinianism into 



Roman Catholicism 265 

the background, and transforming and modifying it, 
without, however, being able wholly to destroy it ; 
secondly, that all the great personalities who have 
continued to kindle religious fervour afresh in the 
Western Church, and to purify and deepen it, have 
directly or indirectly proceeded from Augustine and 
formed themselves on him. The long chain of 
Catholic reformers, from Agobard and Claudius of 
Turin in the ninth century down to the Jansenists in 
the seventeenth and eighteenth, and beyond them, is 
Augustinian. And if the Council of Trent may in 
many respects be rightly called a Council of Reform ; 
if the doctrine of penance and grace was formulated 
then with much more depth and inwardness than 
could be expected from the state of Catholic theology 
in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, that is only 
owing to the continued influence of Augustine. With 
the doctrine of grace taken from Augustine, the 
Church has, indeed, associated a practice of the 
confessional which threatens to make that doctrine 
^absolutely ineffective. But however far it may stretch 
its bounds so as to keep all those within its pale who 
do not revolt against its authority, it after all not only 
tolerates such as take the same view of sin and grace 
as Augustine, but it also desires that, wherever possible, 
everyone may feel as strongly as he the gravity of sin 
and the blessedness of belonging to God. 

Such are the essential elements of Roman Catholi- 



266 What is Christianity? 

cism. There is much else that might be mentioned, 
but what has been said denotes the leading points. 

We pass to the last question : What modifications 
has the Gospel here undergone, and how much of it 
is left ? Well — this is not a matter that needs many 
words — the whole outward and visible institution of a 
Church claiming divine dignity has no foundation 
whatever in the Gospel. It is a case, not of distortion, 
but of total perversion. Religion has here strayed 
away in a direction that is not its own. As Eastern 
Catholicism may in many respects be more appropri- 
ately regarded as part of the history of Greek religion 
than of the history of the Gospel, so Roman Catholi- 
cism must be regarded as part of the history of the 
Roman World-empire, To contend, as it does, that 
Christ founded a kingdom ; that this kingdom is the 
Roman Church ; that he equipped it with a sword, nay, 
with two swords, a spiritual and a temporal, is to 
secularise the Gospel ; nor can this contention be sus- 
tained by appealing to the idea that Christ's spirit 
ought certainly to bear rule amongst mankind. The 
Gospel says, " Christ's kingdom is not of this world,*" 
but the Church has set up an earthly kingdom ; Christ 
demands that his ministers shall not rule but serve, 
but here the priests govern the world ; Christ leads 
his disciples away from political and ceremonious 
religion and places every man face to face with God — 



Roman Catholicism 267 

God and the soul, the soul and its God — but here, on 
the contrary, man is bound to an earthly institution 
with chains that cannot be broken, and he must obey ; 
it is only when he obeys that he approaches God. 
There was a time when Roman Christians shed their 
blood because they refused to do worship to Caesar, and 
rejected religion of the political kind ; to-day they do 
not, indeed, actually pray to an earthly ruler, but they 
have subjected their souls to the despotic orders of the 
Roman papal king. 



LECTURE XV. 

The point to which we referred at the close of the last 
lecture was that, as an outward and visible Church and a 
State founded on law and on force, Roman Catholicism 
has nothing to do with the Gospel, nay, is in fundamental 
contradiction with it. That this State has borrowed 
a divine lustre from the Gospel, and finds this lustre 
extraordinarily advantageous, cannot avail to upset 
the verdict. To mingle the divine with the secular, and 
what is innermost in a man with a political element, is 
to work the greatest of mischiefs, because the conscience 
is thereby enslaved and religion robbed of its solemn 
character. It is inevitable that this character should 
be lost when every possible measure which serves to 
maintain the earthly empire of the church — for example, 
the sovereignty of the Pope — is proclaimed as the 
divine will. We are reminded, however, that it is just 
this independent action on the part of the Church which 
saves religion in Western Europe from entirely degener- 
ating into nationality or the State or police. The 
Church, it is urged, has maintained intact the high idea of 

the complete self-subsistence of religion and its independ- 

268 



Roman Catholicism 269 

ence of the State. We may admit the claim, but the price 
which Western Europe has had to pay for this service, 
and still pays, is much too great ; by having to pay so 
heavy a tribute, the nations are threatened with bank- 
ruptcy within ; and as for the Church, the capital 
which it has amassed is truly a capital that consumes. 
With all the apparent increase in its power, a pauperis- 
ing process is being accomplished in the Church, slowly 
but surely. Let me here digress from our subject for 
a moment. 

No one who looks at the present political situation 
can have any ground for asserting that the power of 
the Roman Church is on the wane. What a growth it 
has experienced in the nineteenth century ! And yet — 
anyone with a keen eye sees that the Church is far from 
possessing now such a plenitude of power as it enjoyed 
in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, when all the 
material and spiritual forces available were at its disposal. 
Since that epoch its power has, in point of intensity^ 
suffered an enormous decline^ arrested by a few brief 
outbursts of enthusiasm between 1540 and 1620, and in 
the nineteenth century. Earnest Catholics, concerned 
at this fact, make no secret of it ; they know and admit 
that an important portion of the spiritual possessions 
necessary to the dominion of the Church has been 
lost to it. And again ; what is the position of the 
Latin nations which, when all is said, form the proper 
province of the Eoman Churches rule ? There is only 



270 What is Christianity? 

one of them which can really be called a great Power, 
and what sort of spectacle will it present in another 
generation ? As a State this Church lives to-day, to a 
not inconsiderable extent, on its history, its old Roman 
mediaeval history ; and it lives as the Roman empire of 
the Romans. But empires do not live for ever. Will 
the Church be capable of maintaining itself in the great 
changes to come ? Will it bear the increasing tension 
between it and the intellectual life of the people ? 
Will it survive the decline of the Latin nations ? 

But let us leave this question to answer itself. Let 
us recollect, rather, that this Church, thanks above all 
to its Augustinianism, possesses in its orders of monk- 
hood and its religious societies a deep element of life 
in its midst. In all ages it has produced saints, so far 
as men can be so called, and it still produces them 
to-day. Trust in God, unaffected humility, the assur- 
ance of redemption, the devotion of one's life to the 
service of one's brethren, are to be found in it ; many 
brethren take up the cross of Christ and exercise at 
one and the same time that self-judgment and that 
joy in God which Paul and Augustine achieved. The 
Imitatio Christi kindles independent religious life and 
a fire which burns with a flame of its own. Ecclesi- 
asticism has not availed to suppress the power of the 
Gospel, which, in spite of the frightful weight that it 
has to carry, makes its way again and again. It still 
works like leaven, nor can we fail to see that this 



Roman Catholicism 271 

Church, side by side with a lax morality for which it 
has often enough been to blame, has, by the mouth of 
its great mediaeval theologians, fruitfully applied the 
Gospel to many circumstances of life and created a 
Christian ethics. Here and elsewhere it has proved 
that it not only carries, as it were, the thoughts of the 
Gospel with it, as a river carries grains of gold, but 
that they are bound up with it and have been further 
developed in it. The infallible Pope, the " Apostolico- 
Roman polytheism,^' the veneration of the Saints, 
blind obedience, and apathetic devotion — these things 
seem to have stifled all inwardness, and yet there are 
Christians still to be found in this Church, too, of the 
kind which the Gospel has awakened, earnest and 
loving, filled with joy and peace in God. Lastly, the 
mischief is not that the Gospel has been bound up 
with political forms at all — Melanchthon was no traitor 
when he expressed his willingness to acknowledge the 
Pope if he would permit the Gospel to be preached 
in its purity — but it lies in the sanctification of the 
political element, and in the inability of this Church 
to get rid of what was once of service in particular 
historical circumstances, but has now become an obstruc- 
tion and a clog. 

We now pass to the last section in the exposition of 
our subject. 



272 What is Christianity? 

The Christian Religion in Protestantism. 

Anyone who looks at the external condition of 
Protestantism, especially in Germany, may, at first 
sight, well exclaim : " What a miserable spectacle ! '*"' 
But no one can survey the history of Europe from the 
second century to the present time without being 
forced to the conclusion that in the whole course of 
this history the greatest movement and the one most 
pregnant with good was the Reformation in the six- 
teenth century ; even the great change which took 
place at the transition to the nineteenth is inferior to 
it in importance. What do all our discoveries and 
inventions and our advances in outward civilisation 
signify in comparison with the fact that to-day there 
are thirty millions of Germans, and many more millions 
of Christians outside Germany, who possess a religion 
without priests, without sacrifices, without " fragments *" 
of grace, without ceremonies — a spiritual religion ! 

Protestantism must be understood, first and fore- 
most, by the contrast which it offers to Catholicism, 
and here there is a double direction which any estimate 
of it must take, first as Reformatio?! and secondly as 
Revolution, It was a reformation in regard to the 
doctrine of salvation ; a revolution in regard to the 
Church, its authority, and its apparatus. Hence 
Protestantism is no spontaneous phenomenon, created 
as it were by a " generatio equivoca '"* ; but, as its very 



Protestantism 273 

name implies, it was called into being by the misdeeds 
of the Roman Church having become intolerable. It 
was the close of a long series of cognate but ineffectual 
attempts at reform in the Middle Ages. If the posi- 
tion which it thus holds in history proves its continuity 
with the past, the fact is still more strongly in evidence 
in its own and not inappropriate contention that it 
was not an innovation in regard to religion, but a 
restoration and renewal of it. But from the point of 
view of the Church and its authority, Protestantism was 
undoubtedly a revolutionary phenomenon. We must, 
then, take account of it in both these relations. 

Protestantism was a Reformation^ that is to say, a 
renewal as regards the core of the matter, as regards 
religion, and consequently as regards the doctrine of 
salvation. That may be shown in the main in three 
points. 

In the first place, religion was here brought back 
again to itself, in so far as the Gospel and the cor- 
responding religious experience were put into the 
foreground and freed of all alien accretions. Religion 
was taken out of the vast and monstrous fabric which 
had been previously called by its name — a fabric 
embracing the Gospel and holy water, the priesthood 
of all believers and the Pope on his throne, Christ the 
Redeemer and St. Anne — and was reduced to its 
essential factors, to the Word of God and to faith. 

This truth was imposed as a criterion on everything 

18 



274 What is Christianity ? 

that also claimed to be "religion" and to unite on 
terms of equality with those great factors. In the 
history of religions every really important reformation 
is always, first and foremost, a critical redicction to 
principles ; for in the course of its historical develop- 
ment, religion, by adapting itself to circumstances, 
attracts to itself much alien matter, and produces, 
in conjunction with this, a number of hybrid and 
apocryphal elements, which it is necessarily compelled 
to place under the protection of what is sacred. If 
it is not to run wild from exuberance, or be choked 
by its own dry leaves, the reformer must come who 
purifies it and brings it back to itself. This critical 
reduction to principles Luther accomplished in the 
sixteenth century, by victoriously declaring that the 
Christian religion was given only in the Word of 
God and in the inward experience which accords with 
this Word. 

In the second place, there was the definite way in 
which the " Word of God *" and the " experience "' of 
it were grasped. For Luther the " Word *''' did not 
mean Church doctrine; it did not even mean the 
Bible ; it meant the message of the free grace of God 
in Christ which makes guilty and despairing men 
happy and blessed ; and the " experience"" was just the 
certainty of this grace. In the sense in which Luther 
took them, both can be embraced in one phrase : the 
conjident belief in a God of grace. They put an end— J 



i 



Protestantism 275 

such was his own experience, and such was what he 
taught — to all inner discord in a man ; they overcome 
the burden of every ill ; they destroy the sense of 
guilt ; and, despite the imperfection of a man's own 
acts, they give him the certainty of being inseparably 
united with the holy God : 

Now I know and believe 

And give praise without end 
That God the Almighty 

Is Father and Friend, 
A fid that in all troubles, 

Whatever betide, 
He hushes the tempest 

And stands at my side. 

Nothing, he taught, is to be preached but the God 
of Grace, with whom we are reconciled through Christ, f 
Conversely, it is not a question of ecstasies and visions ; 
no transports of feeling are necessary ; it is faith that 
is to be aroused. Faith is to be the beginning, middle, 
and end of all religious fervour. In the correspondence 
of Word and faith "justification"" is experienced, and 
hence justification holds the chief place in the 
Reformers'* message ; it means nothing less than the 
attainment of peace and freedom in God through 
Christ, dominion over the world, and an eternity within. 

Lastly, the third feature of this renewal was the 
great transformation which GocCs worship now inevit- 
ably underwent, God's worship by the individual and 



276 What is Christianity? 

by the community. Such worship — this was obvious 
— can and ought to be nothing but putting faith to 
practical proof. As Luther declared over and over 
again, " all that God asks of us is faith, and it is 
through faith alone that He is willing to treat with us."*' 
To let God be God, and to pay Him honour by 
acknowledging and invoking Him as Father ■ — it is 
thus alone that a man can serve Him. Every other 
path on which a man tries to approach Him and 
honour Him leads astray, and vain is the attempt to 
establish any other relation with Him. What an 
enormous mass of anxious, hopeful, and hopeless effort 
was now done away with, and what a revolution in 
worship was effected ! But all that is true of God''s 
worship by the individual is true in exactly the same 
way of public worship. Here, too, it is only the Word 
of God and prayer which have any place. All else is 
to be banished ; the community assembled for God''s 
worship is to proclaim the message of God with praise 
and thanksgiving, and call upon His name. Anything 
that goes beyond this is not worship at all. 

These three points embrace the chief elements in the 
Reformation. What they involved was a renezval of 
religion ; for not only do they denote, albeit in a 
fashion of their own, a return to Christianity as it 
originally was, but they also existed themselves in 
Western Catholicism, although buried in a heap of 
rubbish. 



I 



Protestantism 277 

But, before we go further, permit me two brief 
digressions. We were just saying that the community 
assembled for God'*s worship must not solemnise its 
worship in any other way than by proclaiming the 
Word and by prayer. To this, however, we must add, 
according to the Reformers'* injunctions, that all that 
is to stamp this community as a Church is its existence 
as a community of the faith in which God's Word is 
preached aright. Here we may leave the sacraments 
out of account, as, according to Luther, they, too, 
derive their entire importance from the Word. But 
if Word and faith are the only characteristics of 
worship, it looks as if those who contend that the 
Reformation did away with the visible Church and 
put an invisible one in its place were right. But the 
contention does not tally with the facts. The distinc- 
tion between a visible and an invisible Church dates 
back as far as the Middle Ages, or even, from one point 
of view, as far as Augustine. Those who defined the 
true Church as " the number of the predestined ''** were 
obliged to maintain that it was wholly invisible. But 
the German Reform.ers did not so define it. In declaring 
the Church to be a community of the faith in which 
God's Word is preached aright, they rejected all 
the coarser characteristics of a Church, and certainly 
excluded the visibility that appeals to the senses ; but 
— to take an illustration — who would say that an 
intellectual community, for example, a band of young 



278 What is Christianity? 

men all alike eagerly devoted to knowledge or the 
interests of their country, was " invisible," because it 
possesses no external characteristics, and cannot be 
counted on one*'s fingers ? Just as little is the evan- 
gelical Church an "invisible'*'' community. It is a 
community of the spirit, and therefore its " visibility ''^ 
takes different phases and different degrees of strength. 
There are phases of it where it is absolutely unrecognis- 
able, and others, again, where it stands forth with the 
energy of a power that appeals to the senses. It can 
never, indeed, take the sharp contours of a State like 
the Venetian republic or the kingdom of France — such 
was the comparison which a great exponent of Catholic 
dogmatics declared to be applicable to his Church 
— but as Protestants we ought to know that we belong, 
not to an " invisible **** Church, but to a spiritual 
community which disposes of the forces pertaining to 
spiritual communities — a spiritual community resting 
on earth, but reaching to the Eternal. 

And now as to the other point : Protestantism 
maintains that, objectively, the Christian community 
is based upon the Gospel alone, but that the Gospel 
is contained in Holy Scripture. From the very begin- 
ning it has encountered the objection that, if that be 
so, and at the same time there be no recognised ■ 
authority to decide what the purport and meaning of 
the Gospel is and how it is to be ascertained from the 
Scriptures, general confusion will be the result ; that 



Protestantism 279 

of this confusion the history of Protestantism affords 
ample testimony ; that if every man has a warrant to 
decide what the "true understanding^** of the Gospel 
is, and in this respect is bound to no tradition, no 
council, and no pope, but exercises the free right of 
research, any unity, community, or Church is absolutely 
impossible; that the State, therefore, must interfere, 
or some arbitrary limit be fixed. That no Church 
possessing the Sacred Office of the Inquisition can arise 
in this way is certainly true ; further, that to impose 
any external limits on a community from the inside is 
a simple impossibility. What has been done by the 
State or under pressure of historical necessities does 
not affect the question at all ; the structures which 
have arisen in this way are, in the Protestant sense, 
only figuratively called " Churches." Protestantism 
reckons — this is the solution — upon the Gospel being 
something so simple^ so divine^ and therefore so truly 
human^ as to be most certain of being understood when 
it is left entirely free^ and also as to produce essentially 
the same experiences and convictions in individual souls. 
In this it may often enough make mistakes ; differences 
of individuality and education may issue in very hetero- 
geneous results ; but still, in this its attitude, it has 
not up to now been put to shame. A real, spiritual 
community of Protestant Christians ; a common con- 
viction as to what is most important and as to its 
application to life in all its forms, has arisen and is 



28o What is Christianity? 

in fiill force and vigour. This community embraces 
Protestants in and outside Germany, Lutherans, Calvin- 
ists, and adherents of other denominations. In all of 
them, so far as they are earnest Christians, there lives 
a common element, and this element is of infinitely 
greater importance and value than all their differences. 
It keeps us to the Gospel and it protects us from 
modern heathenism and from relapse into Catholicism. 
More than this we do not need ; nay, any other fetter 
we reject. This, however, is no fetter, but the con- 
dition of our freedom. And when we are reproached 
with our divisions and told that Protestantism has as 
many doctrines as heads, we reply, " So it has, but we 
do not wish it otherwise ; on the contrary, we want 
still more freedom, still greater individuality in utter- 
ance and in doctrine ; the historical circumstances 
necessitating the formation of national and free 
churches have imposed only too many rules and 
limitations upon us, even though they be not pro- 
claimed as divine ordinances ; we want still more 
confidence in the inner strength and unifying power 
of the Gospel, which is more certain to prevail in free 
conflict than under guardianship ; we want to be a 
spiritual realm and we have no desire to return to the 
fleshpots of Egypt ; we are well aware that in the 
interests of order and instruction outward and visible 
connnunities must arise ; we are ready to foster their 
growth, so far as they fulfil these aims and deserve to 



Protestantism 281 

be fostered ; but we do not hang our hearts upon them, 
for they may exist to-day and to-morrow give place, 
under other political or social conditions, to new 
organisations ; let anyone who has such a Church 
have it as though he had it not ; our Church is not 
the particular Church in which we are placed, but the 
' societas fidei ' which has its members everywhere, even 
among Greeks and Romans." That is the Protestant 
answer to the reproach that we are " divided," and 
that is the language which the liberty that has been 
given to us employs. Let us now return from these 
digressions to the exposition of the essential features 
of Protestantism. 

Protestantism was not only a Reformation but also 
a Revolution, From the legal point of view the whole 
Church system against which Luther revolted could 
lay claim to full obedience. It had just as much legal 
validity in Western Europe as the laws of the State 
themselves. When Luther burnt the papal bull he 
undoubtedly performed a revolutionary act — revolu- 
tionary, not in the bad sense of a revolt against legal 
ordinance which is also moral ordinance as well, but 
certainly in the sense of a violent breach with a given 
legal condition. It was against this state of things 
that the new movement was directed, and it was to 
the following chief points that its protest in word and 
deed extended. Firstly : It protested against the 
entire hierarchical and priestly system in the Church, 



282 What is Christianity? 

demanded that it should be abolished, and abolished 
it in favour of a common priesthood and an estab- 
lished order formed on the basis of the congregation. 
What a range this demand had, and to what an extent 
it interfered with the previously existing state of 
things, cannot be told in a few sentences. To explain 
it all would take hours. Nor can we here show how 
the various arrangements actually took shape in the 
Protestant churches. That is not a matter of funda- 
mental importance, but what is of fundamental 
importance is that the " divine '" rights of the Church 
were abolished. 

Secondly : It protested against all formal, external 
authority in religion ; against the authority, therefore, 
of councils, priests, and the whole tradition of the 
Church. That alone is to be authority which shows 
itself to be such within and effects a deliverance : the 
thing itself, therefore, the Gospel. Thus Luther also ^ 
protested against the authority of the letter of the 
Bible ; but we shall see that this was a point 
on which neither he nor the rest of the Reformers 
were quite clear, and where they failed to draw 
the conclusions which their insight into fundamentals 
demanded. 

Thirdly : It protested against all the traditional 
arrangements for public worship, all ritualism, and 
every sort of " holy work.""* As it neither knows nor 
tolerates, as we have seen, any specific form of 



Protestantism 283 

worship, any material sacrifice and service to God, 
any mass and any works done for God and with 
a view to salvation, the whole traditional system of 
public worship, with its pomp, its holy and semi-holy 
articles, its gestures and processions, came to the 
ground. How much could be retained in the way 
of form for aesthetic or educational reasons was, in 
comparison with this, a question of entirely secondary 
importance. 

Fourthly : It protested against Sacramentalism. 
Baptism and the Lord's Supper it left standing, as 
institutions of the primitive Church, or, as it might 
be, of the Lord himself; but it desired that they 
should be regarded either as symbols and marks by 
which the Christian is known, or as acts deriving 
their value exclusively from that message of the 
forgiveness of sins which is bound up with them. All 
other sacraments it abolished, and with them the 
whole notion of God*'s grace and help being accessible 
in bits, and fused in some mysterious way with definite 
corporeal things. To sacramentalism it opposed the 
Word^ and to the notion that grace was given by 
bits the conviction that there is only one grace, namely, 
to possess God Himself as the source of grace. It was 
not because Luther was so very enlightened that in 
his tract "On the Babylonian Captivity'''' he rejected 
the whole system of Sacramentalism — he had enough 
superstition left in him to enable him to advance some 



284 What is Christianity? 

very shocking contentions — but because he had had 
inner experience of the fact that where "grace*" does 
not endow the soul with the living God Himself it 
is an illusion. Hence for him the whole doctrine of 
sacramentalism was an infringement of God'*s majesty 
and an enslavement of the soul. 

Fifthly : It protested against the double form of 
morality, and accordingly against the " higher **" form ; 
against the contention that it is particularly well- 
pleasing to God to make no use of the powers and 
gifts which are part of creation. The Reformers had 
a strong sense of the fact that the world passes away 
with the lusts thereof; we must certainly not represent 
Luther as the modern man cheerfully standing with 
his feet firmly planted on the earth ; on the contrary, 
like the men of the Middle Ages he had a strong 
yearning to be rid of this world and to depart from 
the " vale of tears.'*'' But because he was convinced 
that we neither can nor ought to offer God anything 
but trust in Him, he arrived, in regard to the Chris- 
tian''s position in the world, at quite different opinions 
from those which were advanced by the grave monks 
of previous centuries. As fastings and ascetic practices 
had no value befoie God, and were of no advantage 
to one's fellowmen, and as God is the Creator of all 
things, the most useful thing that a man can do is to 
remain in the position in which God has placed him. 
This conviction gave Luther a cheerful and confident 



Protestantism 285 

view of earthly ordinances, which contrasts with and 
actually got the upper hand of his inclination to turn 
his back upon the world. He advanced the definite 
opinion that all positions in life — constituted authority, 
the married state, and so on, down to domestic service — 
existed by the will of God, and were therefore genuinely 
spiritual positions in which we are to serve God ; a 
faithful maidservant stands higher, with him, than 
a contemplative monk. Christians are not to be always 
devising how they may find some new paths of their 
own, but to show patience and love of neighbour 
within the sphere of their given vocation. Out of this 
there grew up in his mind the notion that all worldly 
laws and spheres of activity have an independent title. 
It is not that they are to be merely tolerated, and have 
no right to exist until they receive it from the Church. 
No ! they have rights of their own, and they form the 
vast domain in which the Christian is to give proof 
of his faith and love ; nay, they are even to be respected 
in places which are as yet ignorant of God'^s revelation 
in the Gospel. 

It was thus that the same man who asked nothing 
of the world, so far as his own personal feelings were 
concerned, and whose soul was troubled only by thought 
for the Eternal, delivered mankind from the ban of 
asceticism. He was thereby really and truly the life 
and origin of a new epoch, and he gave it back a simple 
and unconstrained attitude towards the world, and a 



286 What is Christianity? 

good conscience in all earthly labour. This fruitful 
work fell to his share, not because he secularised 
religion, but because he took it so seriously and so 
profoundly that, while in his view it was to pervade 
all things, it was itself to be freed from everything 
external to it. 



LECTURE XVI. 

The question has often been raised whether, and to 
what extent, the Reformation was a work of the 
German spirit. I cannot here go into this comphcated 
problem. But this much seems to me to be certain, 
that while we cannot, indeed, connect Luther'^s momen- 
tous religious experiences with his nationality, the 
results, positive as well as negative, with which he 
invested them display the German — the German man 
and German history. From the time that the Germans 
endeavoured to make themselves really at home in the 
religion handed down to them — this did not take 
place until the thirteenth century onwards — they were 
preparing the way for the Reformation. And just as 
Eastern Christianity is rightly called GreeJc^ and the 
Christianity of the Middle Ages and of Western 
Europe is rightly called Roman^ so the Christianity of 
the Reformation may be described as Germanic^ in spite 
of Calvin. For Calvin was Luther's pupil, and he 
made his influence most lastingly felt, not among the 
Latin nations but among the English, the Scotch, and 
the Dutch. Through the Reformation the Germans 
mark a stage in the history of the Universal Church. 

No similar statement can be made of the Slavs. 

287 



288 What is Christianity? 

The recoil from asceticism, which as an ideal never 
penetrated the Germans to the same extent as other 
nations, and the protest against religion as external 
authority, are to be set down as well to the Pauline 
Gospel as to the German spirit. Luther's warmth and 
heartiness in preaching, and his frankness in polemical 
utterance, were felt by the German nation to be an 
opening out of its own soul. 

In the previous lecture we touched upon the chief 
provinces in which Luther raised an emphatic and 
still effective protest. There is much upon which I 
could also dwell : for example, upon the opposition 
which, especially at the commencement of his reform- 
ing activity, he offered to the whole terminology of 
dogmatics, its formulae and doctrinal utterances. To 
sum up : he protested, because his aim was to restore 
the Christian religion in its purity, without priests 
and sacrifices, without external authorities and ordi- 
nances, without solemn ceremonies, without all the 
chains with which the Beyond was to be bound to 
the Here. In its revising ardour the Reformation 
went back not only earlier than the eleventh century, 
not only earlier than the fourth or the second, but to 
the very beginnings of religion. Nay, without being 
aware of it, the Reformation even modified or entirely 
put aside forms which existed even in the apostolic 
age : thus in matters of discipline it abolished fasting ; 



1 



Protestantism 289 

in matters of constitution it abolished bishops and 
deacons ; in matters of doctrine it abolished, among 
other things, Chiliasm. 

But with the change effected by Reformation and 
Revolution, how does the new creation stand as a 
whole in regard to the Gospel? We may say that 
in the four leading points which we emphasised in 
the previous lecture — inwardness and spirituality, the 
fundamental thought of the God of grace. His worship 
in spirit and in truth, and the idea of the Church as a 
community of faith — the Gospel was in reality re- won. 
Need I prove this in detail, or are we to be shaken in 
our conviction because, as is surely the case, a Christian 
in the sixteenth and in the nineteenth century presents 
an appearance different from that which a Christian 
presented in the first ? That the inwardness and 
individualism which the Reformation disengaged accord 
with the character of the Gospel is certain. Further, 
Luther's pronouncement on justification not only re- 
flects in the main, and in spite of certain irreducible 
differences, PauFs train of thought, but is also in point 
of aim in exact correspondence with Jesus'* teaching. 
To know God as one'^s Father, to possess a God of 
grace, to find comfort in His grace and providence, to 
believe in the forgiveness of sins — in both cases that 
is the point on which everything turns. And in the 

troubled times of Lutheran orthodoxy a Paul Gerhardt 

19 



290 What is Christianity? 

succeeded in giving such grand expression to this funda- 
mental conviction of the Gospel in his hymns, " Is God 
for me ? Then let all," and " Commit thy ways,"'' as to 
convince us how truly Protestantism was penetrated 
with it. Again, that the right worship of God ought 
to be nothing but the acknowledgment of God in 
praise and prayer, and that the love of neighbour is 
also worship, is taken direct from the Gospel and 
Paul's corresponding injunctions. Lastly, that the 
true Church is held together by the Holy Ghost and 
by faith ; that it is a spiritual community of brothers 
and sisters, is a conviction which is in line with the 
Gospel, and was most clearly expressed by Paul. In 
so far as the Reformation restored all this, and also 
recognised Christ as the only Redeemer, it may in the 
strictest sense of the word be called evangelical ; and 
in so far as these convictions, crippled and burdened 
though they may be, retain their ascendency in the 
Protestant Churches, they have every warrant for being 
so described. 

But what was here achieved had its dark side as 
well. If we ask what the Reformation cost us, and to 
what extent it made its principles prevail, we shall see 
this dark side very clearly. 

We get nothing from history without paying for it, 
and for a violent movement we have to pay double. 
What did the Reformation cost us ? I will not speak 



Protestantism 291 

of the fact that the unity of Western civilisation was 
destroyed, since it was after all only over a part of 
Western Europe that the Reformation prevailed, for 
the freedom and many-sided character of the resulting 
development brought us a greater gain. But the 
necessity of establishing the new Churches as State- 
Churches was attended by serious disadvantages. The 
system of an ecclesiastical State is, of course, worse, 
and its adherents have truly no cause to praise it in 
contrast with the State-Churches. But still the latter — 
which are not solely the outcome of the breach with 
ecclesiastical authority, but were already prepared for 
in the fifteenth century — have been the cause of much 
stunted growth. They have weakened the feeling 
of responsibility^ and diminished the activity^ of the 
Protestant communities ; and, in addition, they have 
aroused the not unfounded suspicion that the Church 
is an institution set up by the State, and accordingly 
to be adjusted to the State. Much has happened, 
indeed, in the last few decades to check that suspicion 
by the greater independence which the Churches have 
obtained ; but further progress in this direction is 
necessary, especially in regard to the freedom of indi- 
vidual communities. The connexion with the State 
must not be violently severed, for the Churches have 
derived much advantage from it ; but steps must be 
taken to further the development upon which we have 
entered. If this results in multifarious organisations 



292 What is Christianity? 

in the Church, it will do no harm ; on the contrary, it 
will remind us, in a forcible way, that these forms are 
all arbitrary. 

Further, Protestantism was forced by its opposition 
to Catholicism to lay exclusive emphasis on the inward 
character of religion, and upon ^' faith alone *" ; but to 
formulate one doctrine in sharp opposition to another is 
always a dangerous process. The man in the street is 
not sorry to hear that " good works "^ are unnecessary, 
nay, that they constitute a danger to the soul. 
Although Luther is not responsible for the convenient 
misunderstanding that ensued, the inevitable result was 
that in the reformed Churches in Germany from the 
very start there were accusations of moral laxity and 
a want of serious purpose in the sanctification of life. 
The saying " If ye love me, keep my commandments '^ 
was unwarrantably thrust into the background. Not 
until the Pietistic movement arose was its central 
importance once more recognised. Up till then the 
pendulum of the conduct of life took a suspicious swing 
in the contrary direction, out of opposition to the 
Catholic "justification by works.*" But religion is not 
only a state of the heart ; it is a deed as well ; it is 
faith active in love and in the sanctification of life. 
This is a truth with which Protestant Christians must 
become much better acquainted, if they are not to be 
put to shame. 

There is another point closely connected with what 



Protestantism 293 

I have just mentioned. The Reformation abolished 
monasticism, and was bound to abolish it. It rightly 
affirmed that to take a vow of lifelong asceticism was 
a piece of presumption ; and it rightly considered that 
any worldly vocation, conscientiously followed in the 
sight of God, was equal to, nay, was better than, being . 
a monk. But something now happened which Luther 
neither foresaw nor desired: " monasticism,**' of the 
kind that is conceivable and necessary in the Protes- 
tant sense of the word, disappeared altogether. Every 
community, however, stands in need of personalities 
living exclusively for its ends. The Church, for 
instance, needs volunteers who will abandon every other 
pursuit, renounce "the world,"' and devote themselves 
entirely to the service of their neighbour ; not because 
such a vocation is " a higher one,*'*' but because it is a 
necessary one, and because no Church can live without 
also giving rise to this desire. But in the Protestant 
Churches the desire has been checked by the decided 
attitude which they have been compelled to adopt 
towards Catholicism. It is a high price that we have 
paid ; nor can the price be reduced by considering, on 
the other hand, how much simple and unaffected 
religious fervour has been kindled in home and family 
life. We may rejoice, however, that in the past 
century a beginning has been made in the direction of 
recouping this loss. In the institution of deaconesses 
and many cognate phenomena the Protestant Churches 



294 What is Christianity? 

are getting back what they once ejected through their 
inability to recognise it in the form which it then took. 
But it must undergo a much ampler and more varied 
development. 

Not only had the Reformation to pay a high price ; 
it was also incapable of perceiving all the conclusions to 
which its new ideas led, and of giving them pure effect. 
It is not that the work which it did was not absolutely 
valid and permanent in every particular — how could 
that be, and who could desire it to have been so ? No ! 
it remained stationary in its development even at the 
point at which, to judge by the earnest foundation that 
was laid at the start, higher things might have been 
expected. Various causes combined to produce this 
result. From the year 1526 onwards national Churches 
had to be founded at headlong speed on Protestant 
lines ; they were forced to be " rounded and complete **"* 
at a time when much was still in a state of flux. Then 
again, a mistrust of the left wing, of the " enthusiasts,**'' 
induced the Churches to oft'er an energetic resistance 
to tendencies which they could have accompanied for 
a good l)it of their way. Luther's unwillingness to 
have anything to do with them, nay, the manner in 
which he became suspicious of his own ideas when they 
coincided with those of the " enthusiasts,"' was bitterly 
avenged and came home to the Protestant Churches in 
the Age of Enlightenment. Even at the risk of being 
reckoned among Luther'.s detractors, we must go 



Protestantism 295 

further. This genius had a faith as robust as Paul's, 
and thereby an immense power over the minds and 
hearts of men ; but he was not abreast of the knowledge 
accessible even in his own time. The naive age had 
gone by ; it was an age of deep feeling, of progress, an 
age in which religion could not avoid contact with all 
the powers of mind. In this age it was his destiny to 
be forced to be not only a reformer but also an intel- 
lectual and spiritual leader and teacher. The way of 
looking at the world and at history he had to plan afresh 
for generations ; for there was no one there to help him, 
and to no one else would people listen. But he had 
not all the resources of clear knowledge at his command. 
Lastly, he was always anxious to go back to the origi- 
nal, to the Gospel itself, and, so far as it was possible 
to do it by intuition and inward experience, he did it ; 
moreover, he made some admirable studies in history, 
and in many places broke victoriously through the 
serried lines of the traditional dogmas. But any trust- 
worthy knowledge of the history of those dogmas was 
as yet an impossibility, and still less was any historical 
acquaintance with the New Testament and primitive 
Christianity attainable. It is marvellous how in spite 
of all this Luther possessed so much power of penetra- 
tion and sound judgment. We have only to look at 
his introductions to the books of the New Testament, 
or at his treatise on Churches and Councils, But 
there were countless problems of which he did not even 



296 What is Christianity ? 

know, to say nothing of being able to solve them ; and 
so it was that he had no means of distinguishing 
between kernel and husk, between what was original 
and what was of alien growth. How can we be sur- 
prised, then, if in its doctrine^ and in the view which 
it took of history^ the Reformation was far from being 
a finished product ; and that, where it perceived no 
problems, confusion in its own ideas was inevitable ? It 
could not, like Pallas Athene, spring complete from 
Jupiter'^s head ; as doctrine it could do no more than 
mark a beginnings and it had to reckon on future 
development. But by being rapidly formed into 
national Churches it came. near to itself cutting short 
its further development for all time. 

As regards the confusion and the checks which it 
brought upon itself, we must content ourselves with 
referring to a few leading points. Firstly, Luther 
would admit nothing but the Gospel, nothing but 
what frees and binds the consciences of men, what 
everyone, down to the man-servant and the maid- 
servant, can understand. But then he not only took 
the old dogmas of the Trinity and the two natures 
as part of the Gospel — he was not in a position to 
examine them historically — and even framed new ones, 
but he was absolutely incapable of making any sound 
distinction between " doctrine '" and Gospel ; in this 
respect falling far behind Paul. The necessary result 
was that intellectualism was still in the ascendant ; 




Protestantism 297 

that a scholastic doctrine was again set up as necessary 
to salvation ; and that two classes of Christians once 
more arose : those who understand the doctrine, and 
the minors who are dependent on the others' under- 
standing of it. 

Secondly, Luther was convinced that that alone is 
the " Word of God '^ whereby a man is inwardly born 
anew — the message of the free grace of God in Christ. 
At the highest levels to which he attained in his life 
he was free from every sort of bondage to the letter. 
What a capacity he had for distinguishing between 
law and Gospel, between Old and New Testament, nay, 
for distinguishing in the New Testament itself! All 
that he would recognise was the kernel of the matter, 
clearly revealed as it is in these books, and proving its 
power by its effect on the soul. But he did not make 
a clean sweep. In cases where he had found the letter 
important, he demanded submission to the " it is 
written *" ; and he demanded it peremptorily, without 
recollecting that, where other sayings of the Scriptures 
were concerned, he himself had declared the " it is 
written"*' to be of no binding force. 

Thirdly, grace is the forgiveness of sins, and there- 
fore the assurance of possessing a God of grace, and 
life, and salvation. How often Luther repeated this, 
always with the addition that what was efficacious 
here was the Word — that union of the soul with God 
in the trust and childlike reverence which God's Word 



298 What is Christianity? 

inspires ; it was a personal relation which was here 
involved. But the same man allowed himself to be 
inveigled into the most painful controversies about 
the means of grace, about communion and infant 
baptism. These were struggles in which he ran the 
risk of again exchanging his high conception of grace 
for the Catholic conception, as well as of sacrificing the 
fundamental idea that it is a purely spiritual possession 
that is in question, and that, compared with Word and 
faith, all else is of no importance. What he here 
bequeathed to his Church has become a legacy of woe. 

Fourthly, the counter-Church which, as was in- 
evitable, rapidly arose in opposition to the Roman 
Church, and under the pressure which that Church 
exercised, perceived, not without reason, that its truth 
and its title lay in the re-establishment of the Gospel. 
But whilst the counter-Church privily identified the 
sum and substance of its doctrine with the Gospel, the 
thought also stole in surreptitiously : We^ that is to 
say, the particular Churches which had now sprung up, 
are the tr^ce Church, Luther, of course, was never 
able to forget that the true Church was the sacred 
community of the faithful ; but still he had no clear 
ideas as to the relation between it and the visible 
new Church which had now arisen, and subsequent 
generations settled down more and more into the sad 
misunderstanding : We are the true Church because 
xve have the right " doctrine,'''' This misunderstanding, 



Protestantism 299 

besides giving rise to evil results in self-infatuation 
and intolerance, still further strengthened that mis- 
chievous distinction between theologians and clergy on 
the one side, and the laity on the other, on which we 
have already dwelt. Not, perhaps, in theory, but 
certainly in practice, a double form of Christianity 
arose, just as in Catholicism ; and in spite of the efforts 
of the Pietistic movement it still remains with us to- 
day. The theologian and the clergyman must defend 
the ivhole doctrine and be orthodox ; for the layman it 
suffices if he adheres to certain leading points and 
refrains from attacking the orthodox creed. A very 
well known man, as I have been lately told, expressed 
the wish that a certain inconvenient theologian would 
go over to the philosophical faculty ; " for then,^"* he 
said, " instead of an unbelieving theologian we should 
have a believing philosopher.'^ Here we have the 
logical outcome of the contention that in the Protestant 
Churches, too, doctrine is something laid down for all 
time, and that in spite of being generally binding it is 
a matter of so much difficulty that the laity need not 
be expected to defend it. But if we persist on this 
path, and other confusions become worse confounded 
and take firmer root, there is a risk of Protestantism 
becoming a sorry double of Catholicism. I say a sorry 
double, because there are two things which Protestan- 
tism will never obtain, namely, a pope and monastic 
priests. Neither the letter of the Bible nor any belief 



300 What is Christianity ? 

embodied in creeds can ever produce the unconditional 
authority which Catholics possess in the pope ; and 
Protestantism cannot now return to the monastic priest. 
It retains its national Churches and its married clergy, 
neither of which looks very stately by the side of 
Catholicism, if competition with Catholicism is what 
the Protestant Churches desire. 

Gentlemen, Protestantism is not yet, thank God, in 
such a bad way that the imperfections and confusions 
in which it began have got the upper hand and entirely 
stunted or stifled its true character. Even those among 
us who are convinced that the Reformation in the 
sixteenth century is something that is over and done 
with, are by no means ready to abandon the momentous 
ideas on which it was based, and there is a large 
field in which all earnest Protestant Christians are in 
complete unanimity. But if those who think that the 
Reformation is done with cannot see that its continu- 
ance in the sense of a pure understanding of God'^s 
Word is a question of Hfe and death for Protestantism 
— its continuance has ah'eady borne abundant fruit in 
associations Hke the Evangelical Union — let them at 
least promote the liberty for which Luther fought in 
his best days : " Let the minds of men rush one against 
another and strike ; if some are meanwhile led astray — 
well ! that is what we must expect in war ; where there 
is battle and slaughter, some must fall and be wounded, 
but whoso fights honestly will receive the crown."' 



Protestantism 301 

The reason why the catholicising of the Protestant 
Churches — I do not mean that they are becoming 
papal ; I mean that they are becoming Churches of 
ordinance, doctrine, and ceremony — is so burning a 
question is that three powerful forces are working 
together to further this development. First, there is 
the indiiference of the masses. The tendency of all 
indifference is to put religion on the same plane with 
authority and tradition, but also with priests, hier- 
archies, and the cult of ceremonies. It puts religion 
there, and then goes on to complain of the external 
character and stationary condition of religion, and of 
the "pretensions'' of the clergy; nay, it is capable, 
apparently, at one and the same moment, of mingling 
those complaints with abuse, of contemptuously jeering 
at every active expression of religious feeling, and 
doing homage to every kind of ceremony. This kind 
of indifference has no understanding whatever for 
Protestant Christianity, instinctively tries to suppress 
it, and praises Catholicism at its expense. The second 
of the forces to be taken into consideration is what I 
may call " the natural religion '' — I mean the religion 
of those who live by fear and hope ; whose chief 
endeavour is to find some authority in matters of 
religion ; who are eager to be rid of their own responsi- 
bility and want to be reassured ; who are looking for 
some "adjunct'' to life, whether in its solemn hours 
or in its worst distress, some aesthetic transfiguration. 



302 What is Christianity ? 

or some violent form of assistance till time itself assists. 
All these people are also, without being aware of it, 
putting religion on the Catholic plane ; they want 
" something that they can lean upon,""* and a good deal 
else, too — all kinds of things to stir them up and help 
them ; but they do not want the Christianity of the 
Gospel. But the Christianity of the Gospel in yielding 
to such demands becomes Catholic Christianity. The 
third force I mention unwillingly, and yet I cannot 
pass it over in silence ; it is the State. We must not 
blame the State for setting chief store by the con- 
servative influence which religion and the Churches 
exercise, and the subsidiary effects which they produce 
in respect of reverence, obedience, and public order. 
But this is just the reason why the State exercises 
pressure in this direction, protects all the elements 
of stability in the Churches, and seeks to keep them 
from every inner movement that would call their 
unity and their " public utility "" in question ; nay, 
it has tried often enough to approximate the Church 
to the police, and employ it as a means of maintaining 
order in the State. We can pardon this — let the 
State take the means of power wherever it can find 
them ; but the Church must not allow itself to be 
made into a pliant instrument ; for, side by side with 
all the desolating consequences to its vocation and 
prestige, it would thereby become an outward institu- 
tion in which public order is of greater consequence 



The Gospel 303 

than the spirit, form more important than matter, and 
obedience of higher value than truth. 

In the face of these three so different forces, what 
we have to do is to maintain Christian earnestness and 
hberty as presented in the Gospel. Theology alone 
is unavailing ; what is wanted is firmness of Christian 
character. The Protestant Churches will be pushed 
into the background if they do not make a stand. 
It was out of such free creations as the Pauline com- 
munities were that the Catholic Church once arose. 
Who can guarantee that those Churches, too, will 
not become "Catholic" which had their origin in 
"the liberty of a Christian man''\'^ 

That, however, would not involve the destruction 
of the Gospel : so much, at least, history proves. It 
would be still traceable like a red thread in the centre 
of the web, and somewhere or other it would emerge 
afresh, and free itself from its entangling connexions. 
Even in the outwardly decorated but inwardly decayed 
temples of the Greek and Roman Church it has not 
been effaced. " Venture onwards ! deep down in a 
vault you will still find the altar and its sacred, ever- 
burning lamp ! " This Gospel, associated as it was 
with the speculative ideas and the mystery-worship of 
the Greeks, yet did not perish in them ; united with 
the Roman empire, it held its own even in this fusion, 
nay, out of it gave birth to the Reformation. Its 
dogmatic doctrines, its ordinances of public worship, 



304 What is Christianity ? 



_ 



have changed; nay, what is much more, it has been 
embraced by the simplest and purest minds and by 
the greatest thinkers ; it endeared itself to a St Francis 
and to a Newton. It has outlived all the changing 
philosophies of the world ; it has cast off like a garment 
forms and ideas which were once sacred ; it has par- 
ticipated in the entire progress of civilisation ; it has 
become spiritualised, and in the course of history it 
has learnt how to make a surer application of its ethical 
principles. In its original earnestness and in the 
consolation which it offers, it has come home to 
thousands in all ages ; and in all ages, too, it has 
thrown off all its encumbrances, and broken down all 
barriers. If we were right in saying that the Gospel 
is the knowledge and recognition of God as the Father, 
the certainty of redemption, humility and joy in God, 
energy and brotherly love ; if it is essential to this 
religion that the founder must not be forgotten over 
his message, nor the message over the founder, history 
shows us that the Gospel has, in point of fact, remained 
in force, struggling again and again to the surface. 

You will perhaps have felt that I have not entered 
into present questions, the relation, namely, of the 
Gospel to our present intellectual condition, our whole 
knowledge of the world, and our task therein. But to 
do this with any success in regard to the actual situa- 
tion of affairs would require longer than a few fleeting 
hours. As regards the kernel of the matter, however. 



The Gospel 305 

I have said all that is needful, for no new phase in the 
history of the Christian Religion has occurred since 
the Reformation, Our knowledge of the world has 
undergone enormous changes — every century since the 
Reformation marks an advance, the most important 
being those in the last two ; but, looked at from a 
religious and ethical point of view, the forces and 
principles of the Reformation have not been outrun 
or rendered obsolete. We need only grasp them in 
their purity and courageously apply them, and modern 
ideas will not put any new difficulties in their way. 
The real difficulties in the way of the religion of the 
Gospel remain the old ones. In face of them we can 
" prove ^** nothing, for our proofs are only variations 
of our convictions. But the course which history has 
taken has surely opened up a wide province, in which 
the Christian sense of brotherhood must give practical 
proof of itself quite otherwise than it knew how, or 
was able, to do in the early centuries — I mean the 
social province. Here a tremendous task confronts 
us, and in the measure in which we accomplish it 
shall we be able to answer with a better heart the 
deepest of all questions — the question of the meaning 
of life. 

Gentlemen, it is religion, the love of God and 

neighbour, which gives life a meaning ; knowledge 

cannot do it. Let me, if you please, speak of my own 

SO 



3o6 What is Christianity? 

experience, as one who for thirty years has taken an 
earnest interest in these things. Pure knowledge is 
a glorious thing, and woe to the man who holds it 
light or blunts his sense for it. But to the question, 
Whence, whither, and to what purpose, it gives an 
answer to-day as little as it did two or three thousand 
years ago. It does, indeed, instruct us in facts; it 
detects inconsistencies ; it links phenomena ; it corrects 
the deceptions of sense and idea. But where and how 
the curve of the world and the curve of our own life 
begin — that curve of which it shows us only a section 
— and whither this curve leads, knowledge does not 
tell us. Yet if with a steady will we affirm the forces 
and the standards which on the summits of our inner 
life shine out as our highest good, nay, as our real 
self ; if we are earnest and courageous enough to accept 
them as the great Reality and direct our lives by 
them ; and if we then look at the course of mankind'^s 
history, follow its upward development, and search, in 
strenuous and patient service, for the communion of 
minds in it, we shall not faint in weariness and despair, 
but become certain of God, of the God whom Jesus 
Christ called his Father, and who is also our Father. 



I 



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INDEX UNDER AUTHORS & TITLES 



Acland, Sir C. T. D. Anglican Liberalism, 

12. 

Acts of the Apostles. Harnack, 12 ; Zeller, 8. 
Addis, W. E. Hebrew Religion, 11. 
iEneidea. James Henry, 52, 
Aeroplane, How to Build, Petit, 48. 
Agricultural Chemical Analysis. Wiley, 50. 
Alchemy of Thought, and other Essays. 

Jacks, 20. 
Alcyonium. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
AUin, Rev. Thos. Universalism Asserted, 14. 
Alton, E. H. Romans, 33. 
Alviella, Count Goblet D'. Contemporary 

Evolution of Religious Thought, 14. 
Alviella, Count Goblet D'. Idea of God, 13. 
Americans, The. Hugo Miinsterberg, 30. 
Analysis of Ores. F. C. Phillips, 48. 
Analysis of Theology. E. G. Figg 17. 
Ancient Assyria, Religion of. Sayce, 14. 
Ancient Egyptians, 33. 
Ancient World, Wall Maps of the, 53. 
Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Annotated Texts. Goethe, 39. 
Antedon. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
Anthems. Rev. R. Crompton Jones, 21. 
Antiqua Mater. Edwin Johnson, 20. 
A.nurida. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
A-pocalypse. Bleek, 7, 
A.pocalypse of St John, 37. 
Apologetic of the New Test. E. F. Scott, 12. 
A^postle Paul, the. Lectures on. Pfleiderer, 13. 
?Vpostolic Age, The. Carl von Weizsacker, 6. 
^abian Poetry, Ancient, 34. 
(Vrenicola. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
|\rgument of Adaptation. Rev. G. Henslow, 19. 
\ristotelian Society, Proceedings of, 30. 
IVrmy Series of French and German Novels, 38. 
\scidia. Johnstone, L.M.B^C. Memoirs, 46. 
\sh worth, J. H. Arenicola, 47. 
Assyrian Dictionary. Norris, 35. 
\ssyriology, Essay on. George Evans, 34. 
Astigmatic Letters. Dr. Pray, 48. 
Alhanasius of Alexandria, Canons of, 37. 
\tlas Antiquus, Kiepert's, 52. 
Atonement, Doctrine of the. Sabatier, 10. 
At-one-ment, The. Rev. G. Henslow, 19. 
Auf Verlornem Posten. Dewall, 38. 
Avebury, Lord. Prehistoric Times, 51. 
^vesti, Pahlavi. Persian Studies, 34. 

Babel and Bible. Friedrich Delitzsch, 9. 
Bacon, Roger, The "Opus Majus" of, 29. 
Ball, Sir Robert S. Cunningham Memoir, 44. 
Bases of Religious Belief. C. B. Upton, 14. 
Bastian, H. C. Studies in Heterogenesis, 43. 
Baur. Church History, 7; Paul, 7. 
oayldon, Rev. G. Icelandic Grammar, 38. 
Beard, Rev. Dr. C. Universal Christ, 14 ; 
' Reformation of the Sixteenth Century, 13. 
Beeby, Rev. C. E. Doctrine and Principles, 15. 
Beet, Prof. J. A. Child and Religion, 10. 
Beet-Sugar Making, Nakaido, 48. 
Beginnings of Christianity. Paul Wernle, 4. 
Beliefs about the Bible. M. J. Savage, 25. 
Benedict, F. E. Organic Analysis, 43. 
Jergey, D. G. Practical Hygiene, 43. 



Bevan, Rev. J. O. Genesis and Evolution of 

the Individual Soul, 15. 
Bible. Translated by Samuel Sharpe, 15. 
Bible, Beliefs about. Savage, 25 ; Bible Plants, 

Henslow, 19 ; Bible Problems, Prof. T. K. 

Cheyne, 9 ; How to Teach the, Rev. A. F. 

Mitchell, 22 ; Remnants of Later Syriac 

Versions of, 37. 
Biblical Hebrew, Introduction to. Rev. Jas. 

Kennedy, 35. 
Biltz, Henry. Methods of Determining Mole- 

cular Weights, 43. 
Biology, Principles of. Herbert Spencer, 31. 
Blackburn, Helen. Women's Suffrage, 51. 
Bleek. Apocalypse, 7. 
Boielle, Jas. French Composition, 39 ; Hugo, 

Les Mis^rables, 39; Notre Dame, 39. 
Bolton. History of the Thermometer, 43. 
Book of Prayer. Crompton Jones, 21. 
Books of the New Testament. Von Soden, 10. 
Bousset, Wilhelm. Jesus, 10. 
Bremond, Henri. Mystery of Newman, 15. 
Brewster, H. B. The Prison, 29; The Statu- 
ette and the Background, 29 ; Anarchy and 

Law, 29. 
Britain, B.C. Sharpe, 54. 
British Fisheries. J. Johnstone, 45. 
Bruce, Alex. Topographical Atlas of the 

Spinal Cord, 43. 
Buddha. Prof. H. Oldenberg, 36. 
Burkitt, Prof. F. C. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 

Calculus, Differential and Integral. Harnack, 

44. 
Caldecott, Dr. A. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Campbell, Rev. Canon Colin. First Three 

Gospels in Greek, 15. 
Campbell, Rev. R. J. New Theology Ser- 
mons, 15. 
Cancer. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
Cancer and other Tumours. Chas. Creighton,43. 
Canonical Books of the Old Testament, 3. 
Cape;Dutch. J. F. Van Oordt, 41. 
Cape Dutch, Werner's Elementary Lessons in, 

42. 
Cardium. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
Carlyle, Rev. A. J. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Casey, John. Cunningham Memoirs, 43. 
Catalogue of the London Library, 51. 
Celtic Heathendom. Prof. J. Rhys, 14. 
Celtic Studies. Sullivan, 41. 
Chad wick, Antedon, 47 ; Echinus, 46.^ 
Chaldee Language, Manual of. Turpie, 37. 
Channing's Complete Works, 15. 
Chants and Anthems, 21 ; Chants, Psalms and 

Canticles, 21. 
Character of the Fourth Gospel. Rev. John 

James Tayler, 26. 
Chemical Dynamics, Studies in. J H. Van't 

Hoff, 45. 
Chemistry for Beginners. Edward Hart, 45. 
Chemist's Pocket Manual, 47. 
Cheyne, Prof. T. K. Bible Problems, 9. 
Child and Religion, The, 10. 
Chinese. Werner, 33. 
Chondrus. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46 



58 



INDEX— Continued. 



Christ no Product of Evolution. Rev. G. 

Henslow, 19. 
Christian Creed, Our, 16. 
Christian Life, Ethics of the, 2. 
Christian Life in the Primitive Church. Dob- 

schiitz, 3. 
Christian Religion, Fundamental Truths of 

the. R. Seeberg, 12. 
Christianity, Beginnings of. Wernle, 4. 
Christianity in Talmud and Midrash. R. 

Travers Herford, ip. 
Christianity? What is. Adolf Harnack, 5, 9. 
Chromium, Production of. Max Leblanc, 46. 
Church History. Baur, 7. Schubert, 3. 
Cleveland, R. E. Soliloquies of St. Augustine, 

Closet Prayers. Dr. Sadler, 25. 

Codium. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 

Coit, Dr. Stanton. Idealism and State Church, 
16; Book of Common Prayer, 16. 

Colby, A. L. Reinforced Concrete in 
Europe, 43. 

Cole, Frank J. Pleuronectes, 46. 

Collins, F. H. Epitome of Synthetic Philo- 
sophy, 29. 

Coming Church. Dr. John Hunter, 20. 

Commentary on the Book of Job. Ewald, 7 ; 
Wright and Hirsch, 28 ; Commentary on the 
Old Testament. Ewald, 7 ; Commentary on 
the Psalms. Ewald, 7 ; Protestant, 8, 23. 

Common Prayer for Christian Worship 16. 

Communion with God. Herrmann, 5, 10. 

Conductivity of Liquids. Tower, 49. 

Constitution and Law of the Church. Adolf 
Harnack, 12. 

Confessions of St. Augustine. Harnack, 12. 

Contemporary Evolution of Religious Thought. 
Count Goulet D'Alviella, 14. 

Contes Militaires. Daudet, 38. 

Conybeare, F. C. Apocalypse of St John, 37. 

Cornill, Carl. Introduction to the Old Testa- 
ment, 3. 

Cosmology of the Rigveda. H. W. Wallis, 37. 

Creighton, Chas. Cancer and other Tumours, 
43 ; Tuberculosis^ 43. 

Cuneiform Inscriptions, The. Schrader, 8. 

Cunningham Memoirs, 43, 44. 

Cunningham, D. J., M.D. Lumbar Curve in 
Man and the Apes, 43 ; Surface Anatomy 
of the Cerebral Hemispheres. Cunningham 
Memoir, 44. 

Cussans, Margaret. Gammarus, 47. 

Daniel and its Critics; Daniel and his Pro- 
phecies. Rev. C. H. H. Wright, 28. 

Darbishire, Otto V. Chondrus, 46. 

Daudet, A. Contes Militaires, 38. 

Davids, T. W. Rhys. Indian Buddhism, 13. 

Davis, J. R. Ainsworth. Patella, 47. 

Dawning Faith. H. Rix, 24. 

Delbos, Leon. Student's Graduated French 
Reader, 39. 

Delbos, L. Nautical Terms, 30. 

Delectus Veterum. Theodor Noldeke, 36. 

Delitzsch, Fricdrich. Babel and Bible, 9; 
Hebrew Language, 34 ; Assyrian Grammar, 
34. 



Democracy and Character. Canon Stephen, 26. 
Denmark in the Early Iron Age. C. Engel- 

hardt, 51. 
De Profundis Clamavi. Dr. John Hunter, 20. 
Descriptive Sociology. Herbert Spencer, 33. 
Development of the Periodic Law. Venable, 50. 
Dewall, Johannes v., Auf Verlornem Posten 

and Nazzarena Danti, 38. 
Differential and Integral Calculus, The. Axel 

Harnack, 44. 
Dlllmann, A. Ethiopic Grammar, 34. 
Dipavamsa, The. Edited by Oldenberg, 34. 
Dirge of Coheleth. Rev. C. Taylor, 26. 
Dobschiitz, Ernst von. Christian Life in the 

Primitive Church, 3, 16. 
Doctrine and Principles. Rev. C. E. Beeby, 15. 
Dogma, History of. Harnack, i8. 
Dole, Chas. F. The Ethics of Progress, 16. 
Driver, S. R. Mosheh ben Shesheth, 23. 
Drummond, Dr. Jas. Philo Judaeus, 29 ; Via, 

Veritas, Vita, 13. 

Early Christian Conception. Pfleiderer, lo. 
Early Christian Ethics. Scallard, 31. 
Early Hebrew Story. John P. Peters, 9. 
Ecclesiastical Institutions of Holland. Rev. 

P. H. Wicksteed, 27. 
Echinus. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
Echoes of Holy Thoughts, 17. 
Education. Spencer, 32 ; Lodge, School 

Reform, 40. 
Egyptian Faith, The Old. Naville, 12. 
Egyptian Grammar, Erman's, 34. 
Electric Furnace. H. Moisson, 47. 
Electrolysis of Water. V. Engelhardt, 44. 
Electrolytic Laboratories. Nissenson, 48. 
Eledone. Fz^^ L.M.B.C Memoirs, 47. 
Elementary Chemi.stry. Emery, 44. 
ElementaryOrganic Analysis. F.E.Benedict,43 
Emery, F. B., M.A. Elementary Chemistry, 

44. 
Engelhardt, C. Denmark in Iron Age, 51. 
Engelhardt, V. Electrolysis of Water, 44. 
Engineering Chemistry. T. B. Stillman, 49. 
English Culture, Rise of. E. Johnson, 52. 
English-Danish Dictionary. S. Rosing, 41. 
English-Icelandic Dictionary. Zoega, 42. 
Enoch, Book of. C. Gill, 17. 
Ephesian Canonical Writings. Green, 17. 
Epitome of Synthetic Philosophy. Collins, 29 
Erman's Egyptian Grammar, 34. 
Erzahlungen. Hofer, 38. 
Espin, Rev. T., M.A. The Red Stars, 44. 
Essays on the Social Gospel. Harnack and 

Herrmann, 11. 
Essays. Herbert Spencer, 32. 
Ethica. Prof. Simon Lawrie, 30. 
Ethical Import of Darwinism. Schurman, 30 
Ethics, Data of. Herbert Spencer, 32. 
Ethics, Early Christian. Prof. Scullard, 31. 
Ethics, Principles of. Herbert Spencer, 31. 
Ethics of the Christian Life. Haering, 2. 
Ethics of Progress, The. Dole, 16. 
Ethiopic Grammar. A. Dillmann, 33. 
Eucken, Prof. Life of the Spirit, 12. 
Eugene's Grammar of French Language, 39. 
Evans, George. Essay on Assyriology, 34- 



INDEX— Continued. 



59 



Evolution, A New Aspect of. Formby, 17. 
Evolution, Christ no Product of, 19. 
Evolution of Christianity. C. Gill, 17. 
Evolution of Knowledge. R. S. Perrin, 23. 
Evolution of Religion, The. L. R. Farnell, 10. 
Ewald. Commentary on Job, 7 ; Commentary 

on the Old Testament, 7 ; Commentary on 

the Psalms, 7. 

Facts and Comments. Herbert Spencer, 32. 

Eaith and Morals. W. Herrmann, 9. 

Faizullah-Bhai, Shaikh, B.D. ^ A Moslem 
Present, 34 ; Pre-Islamitic Arabic Poetrj'^, 34. 

Farnell, L. R. The Evolution of Religion, 10. 

Farrie, Hugh. Highways and Byways in 
Literature, 52. 

Fertilizers. Vide Wiley's Agricultural Analysis, 
50- 

Figg, E. G. Analysis of Theology, 17. 

First Principles. Herbert Spencer, 31. 

First Three Gospels in Greek. Rev. Canon 
Colin Campbell, 15. 

Fischer, Prof. Emil. Introduction to the Pre- 
paration of Organic Compounds, 44. 

Flinders Petrie Papyri. Cunn. Memoirs, 44. 

Formby, Rev. C. W. Re-Creation, 17. 

Four Gospels as Historical Records, 17. 

Frankfurter, Dr. O. Handbook of Pali, 35. 

Free Catholic Church. Rev. J. M. Thomas, 27. 

Freezing Point, The, Jones, 45. 

French Composition. Jas. Boielle, 39. 

French History, First Steps in. F. F. Roget, 41. 

French Language, Grammar of. Eugene, 39. 

Fuerst, Dr. Jul. Hebrew and Chaldee Lexi- 
con, 35. 

jammarus. Fz^^ L.M. B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
Gardner, Prof. Percy. Anglican Liberalism, 12 ; 

Modernity and the Churches, 12. 
jeneral Language of the Incas of Peru, 40. 
jenesis. Book of, in Hebrew Text. Rev. C. 

H. H. Wright, 28. 
jenesis, Hebrew Text, 35. 
jeometry. Analytical, Elements of. Hardy, 44. 
jerman Idioms, Short Guide to. Weiss, 42. 
jerman Literature, A Short Sketch of. V. 

Phillipps, B.A., 41. 
jerman. Systematic Conversational Exercises 

in. T. H. Weiss, 41. 
jibson, R. J. Harvey. Codium, 46. 
jill, C. ^ Book of Enoch, 17; Evolution of 

Christianity, 17. 
jjlimpses of Tennyson. A. G. Weld, 55. 
ijoethe, W. v. Annotated Texts, 39. 
i^oldammer, H. The Kindergarten, 52. 
poligher, Dr W. A. Hellenic Studies, and 

Hellenistic Greeks, Romans, 33. 
xospel of Rightness. C. E. Woods, 28. 
Tospels in Greek, First Three, 15. 
Treek Ideas, Lectures on. Re vr. Dr. Hatch, 13. 
' Jreek, Modern, A Course of. Zompolides, 42. 
"xreek New Testament, 6. 
iireeks : Hellenic Era, 33. 
jireen, Rev. A. A. Child and Religion, 10. 
Ureen, Right Rev. A. V. Ephesian Writings, 
.17. 
Itrieben's English Guides, 52. 



Gulistan, The (Rose Garden) of Shaik Sadi ot 

Shiraz, 36. 
Gwynn, John. Later Syriac Versions of the 

Bible, 37. 
Gymnastics, Medical Indoor. Dr. Schreber, 49. 

Haddon, A. C. Decorative Art of British 
Guinea, Cunningham Memoir, 44. 

Haering, T. Ethics of the Christian Life, 2. 

Hagmann, J. G., Ph.D. Reform in Primary 
Education, 39. 

Handley, Rev. H. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 

Hantzsch, A. Elements of Stereochemistry, 44. 

Hardy. Elements of Analytical Geometry, 44 ; 
Infinitesimals and Limits, 44. 

Harnack, Adolf. Acts of the Apostles, 12 ; 
Constitution and Law of the Church, 12 ; 
History of Dogma, 4 ; Letter to the " Preus- 
sische Jahrbucher," 18 ; Luke the Physician, 
II ; Mission and Expansion of Christianity, 
3; Monasticism, 12 ; The Sayings of Jesus, 
12 ; What is Christianity? 5, 9. 

Harnack, Adolf, and Herrmann, W. Essays 
on the Social Gospel, 11. 

Harnack and his Oxford Critics. Saunders, 25. 

Harnack, Axel. Differential and Integral 
Calculus, 44. 

Hart, Edward, Ph.D. Chemistry for Begin- 
ners, 45 ; Second Year Chemistry, 45. 

Hatch, Rev. Dr. Lectures on Greek Ideas, 
13- 

Haughton, Rev. Samuel, M.A., M.D. New 
Researches on Sun-Heat, 43. 

Hausrath. History of the New Test. Times, 7. 

Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon. Dr. Fuerst, 
35. 

Hebrew Language, The. F. Delitzsch, 34. 

Hebrew, New School of Poets, 35. 

Hebrew Religion. W. E. Addis, 11. 

Hebrew Story. Peters, 9. 

Hebrew Texts, 19, 35. 

Hellenic Studies, 32. 

Hellenistic Greeks. Mahaflfy and Goligher, 33. 

Henry, Jas. iEneidea, 52. 

Henslow, Rev. G. The Argument of Adapta- 
tion, 19; The At-one-ment, 19; Christ no 
Product of Evolution, 19 ; Spiritual Teach- 
ings of Bible Plants, 19 ; Spiritual Teaching 
of Christ's Life, 19 ; The Vulgate, 19. 

Henson, Rev. Canon Hensley. Child and 
Religion, to. 

Herdman, Prof. W. A. Ascidia, 46. 

Herford, R. Travers, B.A. Christianity in 
Talmud and Midrash, 19. 

Herrmann, W. Communion, 5, 10 ; Faith and 
Morals, 9. 

Herrmann and Harnack. Essays on the Social 
Gospel, II. 

Heterogenesis, Studies in. H, Bastian, 43. 

Hewitt, C. Gordon. Ligia, 47. 

Hibbert Journal Supplement for 1909, entitled 
Jesus or Christ ? 20. 

Hibbert Journal, The, 20. 

Hibbert, Lectures, The, 13, 14. 

Hickson, Sydney J. Alcyonium, 46. 

Highways and Byways in Literature, 52. 

Hill, Rev. Dr. G. Child and Religion, 10. 



6o 



INDEX— Continued. 



Hindu Chemistry. Prof. P. C. Ray, 48. 
Hirsch, Dr. S. A., and W. Aldis Wright, 

edited by. Commentary on Job, 28. 
History of the Church. Hans von Schubert, 3. 
History of Dogma. Adolf Harnack, 4. 
History of Jesus of Nazara. Keim, 7. 
History of the Hebrews. R. Kittel, 5. 
Historyof the Literature of theO.T. Kautzsch, 

20. 
History of the New Test. Times. Hausrath, 7. 
Hodgson, S. H. Philosophy and Experience, 

29 ; Reorganisation of Philosophy, 29. 
Hoerning, Dr. R. The Karaite MSS., 20. 
Hofer, E. Erzahlungen, 38. 
Hoff, J. H. Van't. Chemical Dynamics, 45. 
HoUins, Dorothea. The Quest, 52. 
Hornell, J. Marine Zoology of Okhamandal, 

45- 
Horner, G. Statutes, The, of the Apostles, 36. 
Horse, Life-SizeModelsof. J.T.ShareJones,45; 

the, Surgical Anatomy of, 45. 
Horton, Dr. R. Child and Religion, 10. 
Howe, J. L. Inorganic Chemistry, 45. 
How to Teach the Bible. Mitchell, 22. 
Hugo, Victor. Les Mis^rables, 39; Notre 

Dame, 39. 
Hunter, Dr. John. De Profundis Clamavi, 20; 

The Coming Church, 20 ; God and Life, 20. 
Hygiene, Handbook of. Bergey, 43. 
Hymns of Duty and Faith. Jones, 21. 

Icelandic Grammar. Rev. G. Bayldon, 38. 
Idea of God. Alviella, Count Goblet D', 13. 
Imms, A. D. Anurida, 47. 
Incarnate Purpose, The. Percival, 23. 
Indian Buddhism. Rhys Davids, 13. 
Individual Soul, Genesis and Evolution of. 

Bevan, 15. 
Individualism and Collectivism. Dr. C. W. 

Saleeby, 30. 
Indoor Gymnastics, Medical, 49. 
Industrial Remuneration, Methods of. D. F. 

Schloss, 54. 
Infinitesimals and Limits. Hardy, 44. 
Inflammation Idea. W. H. Ransom, 48. 
Influence of Rome on Christianity. Renan, 13. 
Inorganic Chemistry. J. L. Howe, 45. 
Inorganic Qualitative Chemical Analysis. 

Leavenworth, 46. 
Introduction to the Greek New Test. Nestle, 6. 
Introduction to the Old Test. Cornill, 3. 
Introduction to the Preparation of Organic 

Compounds. Fischer, 44. 
Isaiah, Hebrew Text, 35. 

Jeremias, Prof. A. Old Testament in the Light 
of the East, 2. 

Jesus of Nazara. Keim, 7. 

Jesus or Christ? The Hibbert Journal Supple- 
ment for 1909, 20. 

Jesus. Wilhelm Bousset, 10. 

Jesus, Sayings of. Harnack, 12. 

Job, Book of. G. H. Bateson Wright, 28. 

Job, Book of. Rabbinic Commentary on, 37. 

Job. Hebrew Text, 35. 

Johnson, Edwin, M.A. Antiqua Mater, 20; 
English Culture, 20 ; Rise of Christendom 20. 



Johnstone, J. British Fisheries, 45 ; Cardium, 

46. 
Jones, Prof. Henry. Child and Religion, 10. 
Jones, Rev. J. C. Child and Religion, 10. 
Jones, Rev- R. Crompton. Hymns of Duty 

and Faith, 21 ; Chants, Psalms and Canticles, 

21; Anthems, 21; The Chants and Anthems, 

21 ; A Book of Prayer, 21. 
Jones, J. T. Share. Life-Size Models of the 

Horse, 45 ; Surgical Anatomy of the Horse, 

45- 
Jones. The Freezing Point, 45, 
Jordan, H. R. Blaise Pascal, 29. 
Journal of the Federated Malay States, 56. 
Journal of the Linnean Society. Botany and 

Zoology, 45, 56. 
Journal of the Quekett Microscopical Club, 

45, 56. 
Journal of the Royal Microscopical Society, 

45j 56. 
Justice. Herbert Spencer, 32. 

Kantian Ethics. J. G. Schurman, 30. 

Karaite MSS. Dr. R. Hoerning, 20. 

Kautzsch, E. History of the Literature of the 
Old Testament, 20. 

Keim. History of Jesus of Nazara, 7. 

Kennedy, Rev. J as. Introduction to Biblical 
Hebrew, 35 ; Hebrew Synonyms, 35. 

Kiepert's New Atlas Antiquus, 52. 

Kiepert's Wall-Maps of the Ancient World, 53. 

Kindergarten, The. H. Goldammer, 52. 

Kittel, R. History of the Hebrews, 5 ; Scienti- 
fic Study, O.T., 12. 

Knight, edited by. Essays on Spinoza, 33. 

Knowledge, Evolution of. Perrin, 23. 

Kuenen, Dr. A. National Religions and Uni- 
versal Religion, 13 ; Religion of Israel, 8. 

Kyriakides, A. Modern Greek-English Dic- 
tionary, 39. 

Laboratory Experiments. Noyes and Mulli- 

ken, 48. 
Ladd, Prof. G. T. Child and Religion, 10. 
Lake, Kirsopp. Resurrection, 11. 
Landolt, Hans. Optical Rotating Power, 46. 
Laurie, Prof. Simon, Ethica, 30; Meta- 

physica Nova et Vetusta, 30. 
Lea, Henry Chas. Sacerdotal Celibacy, 22. 
Leabhar Breac, 40. 
Leabhar Na H-Uidhri, 40. 
Leavenworth, Prof. W. S. Inorganic Quali- 
tative Chemical Analysis, 46. 
Leblanc, Dr. Max. The Production of 

Chromium, 46. 
Le Coup de Pistolet. Merim^e, 38. 
Lepeophtheirus and Lernea. Vide L.M.B.C. 

Memoirs, 46. 
Letter to the *' Preussische Jahrbucher." 

Adolf Harnack, 18. 
Lettsom, W. N., trans, by. Nibclungenlied, 

40. 
Lewis, Agnes Smith. Old Syriac Gospels, 35 
Liberal Christianity. Jean R^ville, 9. 
Life and Matter. Sir O. Lodge, 22. 
Life of the Spirit, The. Eucken, 12. 
Lilja. p;^dited by E. Magnusson, 40. 



INDEX— Continued. 



6i 



Lilley, Rev. A. L. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Lineus. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
Linnean Society of London, Journals of, 56. 
Liverpool Marine Biology Committee Memoirs, 

L-XVL, 47- 
Lluria, Dr. Super-Organic Evolution, 47. 
Lobstein, Paul. Virgin Birth of Christ, 9. 
Lodge, Sir O. Life and Matter, 22 ; School 

Teaching and School Reform. 40. 
Logarithmic Tables. Sang, 49 ; Schroen, 49. 
London Library, Catalogue of, 51. 
London Library Subject Index, 53. 
Long, J. H. A Text-book of Urine Analysis, 

Luke the Physician. Adolf Harnack, 11. 
Lyall, C. J., M.A. Ancient Arabian Poetry, 
35- 

Macan, R. W. The Resurrection of Jesus 

Christ, 22. 
MacColl, Hugh. Man's Origin, Destiny, and 

Duty, 30. 
Macfie, R. C. Science, Matter, and Immor- 
tality, 22. 
Machberoth Ithiel. Thos. Chenery, 35. 
Mackay, R. W. Rise and Progress of Chris- 
tianity, 22. 
Mad Shepherds, and other Studies. Jacks, 

20. 
Magnusson, edited by. Lilja, 40. 
Mahabharata, Index to. S. Sorensen, 36. 
Mahaflfy, J. P. , D. D. Flinders Petrie Papyri. 

Cunningham Memoirs, 44 ; Hellenic Studies, 

33. 
Man and the Bible. J. A. Picton, 24. 
Man's Origin, Destiny, and Duty. MacColl, 

30. 
Man versus the State. Herbert Spencer, 32. 
Maori, Lessons in. Right Rev. W. L. 

Williams, 42. 
Maori, New and Complete Manual of, 40. 
Marine Zoology of Okhamandal, 45. 
Markham, Sir Clements, K.C. B. Vocabularies 

of the Incas of Peru, 40. 
Marriner, G. R. The Kea, 47. 
Martineau, Rev. Dr. James. Modern 

Materialism, 21 ; Relation between Ethics 

and Religion, 21. 
Mason, Prof. W. P. Notes on Qualitative 

Analysis, 47. 
Massoretic Text. Rev. Dr. J. Taylor, 26. 
Masterman, C. F. G. Child and Religion, 

10. 
Meade, R. K. Chemist's Pocket Manual; 

Portland Cement, 47. 
Mediaeval Thought, History of. R. Lane 

Poole, 24. 
Melville, Helen and Lewis. The Seasons, 

Anthology, 54. 
Mercer, Right Rev. J. Edward, D.D. Soul 

of Progress, 22. 
I Meredith, L. B. Rock Gardens, 54. 
iMerim^e, Prosper. Le Coup de Pistolet, 
' 38. 
Metallic Objects, Production of. Dr. W. 

Pfanhauser, 48. 
Metallurgy. Wysor, 50. 



Metaphysica Nova et Vetusta. Prof. Simon 

Laurie, 30. 
Midrash, Christianity in. Herford, 19. 
Milanda Panho, The. Edited by V. 

Trenckner, 35. 
Mission and Expansion of Christianity. Adolf 

Harnack, 3. 
Mitchell, Rev. A. F. How to Teach the 

Bible, 22. 
Mitchell, Rev. C. W. Refutation of Mani, 

Marcion, etc., 37. 
Modern Greek - English Dictionary. Kyria- 

kides, 39. 
Modernity and the Churches. Percy Gardner, 

12. 
Modern Materialism. Rev. Dr. James 

Martineau, 22. 
Moisson, Henri. Electric Furnace, 47. 
Molecular Weights, Methods of Determining. 

Henry Biltz, 43. 
Monasticism. Adolf Harnack, 12. 
Montefiore, C. G. Religion of the Ancient 

Hebrews, 13. 
Moorhouse Lectures. Vide Mercer's Soul of 

Progress, 22 ; Stephen, Democracy and 

Character, 26 ; Green's Ephesian Writings, 

17- 
Morrison, Dr. W. D. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Mosheh ben Shesheth. S. R. Driver. Edited 

by, 23. 
Moslem Present. Faizullah-Bhai, Shaikh, 

B.D., 34. 
Miinsterberg, Hugo. The Americans, 23. 
My Struggle for Light. R. Wimmer, 9. 
Mystery of Newman. Henri Bremond, 15. 

Nakaido. Beet-Sugar Making, 48. 

National Idealism and State Church, 16 ; and 

the Book of Common Prayer, 16. 
National Religions and Universal Religion. 

Dr. A. Kuenen, 13. 
Native Religions of Mexico and Peru. Dr. A. 

R^ville, 14. 
Naturalism and Religion. Dr. Rudolf Otto, 

23.. 
Nautical Terms. L. Delbos, 39. 
Naville, Prof. E. The Old Egyptian Faith, 

12. 
Nestle. Introduction to the Greek New Test., 6. 
New Hebrew School of Poets. Edited by H. 

Brody and K. Albrecht, 35. 
New Theology Sermons. Rev. R. J. Campbell, 

New Zealand Language, Dictionary of. Rt. 

Rev. W. L. Williams, 42. 
Nibelungenlied. Trans. W. L. Lettsom, 40. 
Nissenson. Arrangements of Electrolytic 

Laboratories, 48. 
Noldeke, Theodor. Delectus Veterum, 36 ; 

Syriac Grammar, 36. 
Norris, E. Assyrian Dictionary, 36. 
Norwegian Sayings translated into English, 
Noyes, A. A. Organic Chemistry, 48. 
Noyes, A. A., and Milliken, Samuel. Labora 

tory Experiments, 48. 

O'Grady, Standish, H. Silva Gadelica, 41. 



62 



INDEX— Continued. 



Old and New Certainty of the Gospel. Alex. 

Robinson, 25. 
Oldenberg, Dr. H., edited by. Dipavamsa, 

The, 34. 
Old French, Introduction to. F. F. Roget, 41. 
Old Syriac Gospels, Lewis, 35. 
Old Testament in the Light of the East. 

Jeremias, 2. 
Oordt, J. F. Van, B. A. Cape Dutch, 41. 
Open Letter to English Gentlemen, 54. 
Ophthalmic Test Types. Snellen's, 49. 
Optical Rotating Power. Hans Landolt, 46. 
" Opus Majus " of Roger Bacon, 29. 
Organic Chemistry. A. A. Noyes, 48. 
Otto, Rudolf. Naturalism and Religion, 11. 
Outlines of Church History. Von Schubert, 3. 
Outlines of Psychology. Wilhelm Wundt, 33. 

Pali, Handbook of. Dr. O. Frankfurter, 35. 

Pali Miscellany. V. Trenckner, 36. 

Parker, W. K., F.R.S. Morphology of the 

Duck Tribe and the Auk Tribe, 44. 
Pascal, Blaise. H. R. Jordan, 29. 
Patella. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
Paul. Baur, 7 ; Pfleiderer, 13; Weinel, 3. 
Paulinism. Pfleiderer, 8. 
Pearson, Joseph. Cancer, 47. 
Pecton. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 47. 
Peddie, R. A. Printing at Brescia, 54. 
Percival, G. H. The Incarnate Purpose, 23. 
Perrin, R. S. Evolution of Knowledge, 23. 
Personal and Family Prayers, 23. 
Persian Language, A Grammar of. J. T. 

Plaits, 36. 
Peters, Dr. John P. Early Hebrew Story, 9. 
Petet, R. How to Build an Aeroplane, 48. 
Pfanhauser, Dr. W. Production of Metallic 

Objects, 48. 
Pfleiderer, Otto. Early Christian Conception, 

10; Lectures on Apostle Paul, 13 ; Paulinism, 

8 ; Philosophy of Religion, 8 ; Primitive 

Christianity, 2, 3. 
Phillips, F. C. Analysis of Ores, 48. 
Phillipps, v., B.A. Short Sketch of German 

Literature, 41. 
Philo Judaeus. Dr. Drummond, 17. 
Philosophy and Experience. Hodgson, 29. 
Philosophy of Religion. Pfleiderer, 8. 
Picton, J. AUanson. Man and the Bible, 24. 
Piddington, H. Sailors' Horn Book, 48. 
Pikler, Jul. Psychology of the Belief in 

Objective Existence, 30. 
Platts, J. T. A Grammar ot the Persian 

Language, 36. 
Pleuronectes. K/^^ L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 46. 
Pocket Flora of Edinburgh. C. O. Sonntag, 49. 
Polychaet Larvae. Vide L.M.B.C. Memoirs, 

47- 
Poole, Reg. Lane. History of Mediaeval 

Thought, 24. 
Portland Cement. Meade, 47. 
Pray, Dr. Astigmatic Letters, 48. 
Prayers for Christian Worship. Sadler, 24. 
Prehistoric Times. Lord Avebury, 51. 
Pre-Lslamitic Arabic Poetry. Shaikh Faizul- 

lah-Bhai, B.D., 34. 
Primitive Christianity. Otto Pfleiderer, 2, 3. 



Printing at Brescia. R. A. Peddie, 54. 

Prison, The. H. B. Brewster, 29. 

Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 30. 

Proceedings of the Optical Convention, 48. 

Prolegomena. R^ville, 8. 

Protestant Commentary on the New Testa- 
ment, 8, 24. 

Psalms, Hebrew Text, 34. 

Psychology of the Belief in Objective Exist- 
ence. Jul. Pikler, 30. 

Psychology, Principles of, Spencer, 31 ; Out- 
lines of, Wundt, 33. 

Punnett, R. C. Lineus, 46. 

Qualitative Analysis, Notes on. Prof. W. P. 

Mason, 47. 

Ransom, W. H. The Inflammation Idea, 48. 
Rashdall, Dr. Hastings. Anglican Liberalism, 

12. 
Ray, Prof. P. C. Hindu Chemistry, 48. 
Reasons for Dissenting from the Philosophy of 

M. Comte. Herbert Spencer, 32. 
Re-Creation. Rev. C. W. Formby, 17. 
Recollections of a Scottish Novelist. Walford, 

55- 
Reform in Primary Education. J. G. Hag- 

mann, 39. 
Reformation of the Sixteenth Century. Rev. 

Dr. C. Beard, 15. 
Refutation of Mani, Marcion, etc., 37. 
Reinforced Concrete in Europe. Colby, 43. 
Rejoinder to Prof. Weismann, 32. 
Relation between Ethics and Religion. Rev. 

Dr. James Martineau, 22. 
Religion and Modern Culture. Sabatier, 10. 
Religion of Ancient Egypt. Renouf, 14. 
Religion of the Ancient Hebrews. C. G. 

Montefiore, 13. 
Religion of Israel. Kuenen, 8. 
Religions of Ancient Babylonia and Assyria. 

Prof. A. H. Sayce, 14. 
Religions of Authority and the Spirit. Auguste 

Sabatier, 4. 
Renan, E. Influence of Rome on Christianity, 

13. 
Renouf, P. L. Religion of Ancient Egypt, 14. 
Reorganisation of Philosophy. Hodgson, 29. 
Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Lake, 21 ; 

R. W. Macan, 21. 
Ri^ville, Dr. A. Native Religions of Mexico 

and Peru, 14 ; The Song of Songs, 24. 
R^ville. Prolegomena, 8. 
R6ville, Jean. Liberal Christianity, 9. 
Rhys, Prof. J. Celtic Heathendom, 14. 
Ring of Pope Xystus, 54. 
Rise and Progress of Christianity. R. W. 

Mackay, 22. 
Rise of Christendom. Edwin Johnson, 20. 
Rise of P^nglish Culture. Edwin Johnson, 20. 
Rix, Herljert. Dawning Faith, 24 ; Tent and 

Testament, 24. 
Robinson, Alex. Old and New Certainty of 

the Gospel, 25 ; Study of the Saviour, 25. 
Rock Gardens. L. B. Meredith, 54. 
Roget, F. F. First Steps in French History 

41 ; Introduction to Old French, 41. 



I N D EX— Continued. 



63 



Romans. Alton and Goligher, 33. 
Rosing, S. English-Danish Dictionary, 41. 
Royal Astronomical Society. Memoirs and 

Monthly Notices, 56. 
Royal Dublin Society. Transactions and 

Proceedings, 56. 
Royal Irish Academy. Transactions and 

Proceedings, 56. 
Royal Society of Edinburgh. Transactions 

of, 56. 
Runes, The. Geo. Stephens, 55. 
Runic Monuments, Old Northern. Geo. 

Stephens, 55. 
Ruth, Book of, in Hebrew Text. Rev. C. H. 

H. Wright, 28. 

Sabatier, Auguste. Doctrine of the Atone- 
ment, 10 ; Religions of Authority and the 
Spirit, 4. 

Sacerdotal Celibacy. Henry Chas. Lea, 22. 

Sadi. The Gulistan (Rose Garden) of Shaik 
Sadi of Shiraz, 36. 

Sadler, Rev. Dr. Closet Prayers, 24 ; Prayers 
for Christian Worship, 25. 

Sagas of Olaf Tryggvason and Harold the 
Tyrant, 54. 

Sailors' Horn Book. H. Piddington, 48. 

Saleeby, C. W. Individualism and Collec- 
tivism, 30. 

Sang's Logarithms, 49. 

Saunders, T. B. Harnack and hib Critics, 25. 

Savage, M. J. Beliefs about the Bible, 24. 

Sayce, Prof. A. H. Religion of Ancient 
Assyria, 14. 

Sayings of Jesus, The. Adolf Harnack, 11. 

Scallard. Early Christian Ethics, 31. 

Schloss, D. F. Methods of Industrial Re- 
muneration, 54. 

School Teaching and School Reform. Sir O. 
Lodge, 40. 

Schrader. The Cuneiform Inscriptions, 8. 

Schreber, D. G. M. Medical Indoor Gym- 
nastics, 49. 

Schroen, L. Seven-Figure Logarithms, 48. 

Schubert, Hans von . History of the Church , 3 . 

Schurman, J. Gould. ^ Ethical Import of 
Darwinism, 30 ; Kantian Ethics, 30. 

Science, Matter, and Immortality. R. C. 
Macfie, 22. 

Scientific Study of the Old Testament, 12. 

Scott, Andrew. Lepeophtheirus and Lernea, 
46. 

Scott, E. F. Apologetic of the New Test., 11. 

Scripture, Edward W., Ph.D. Studies from 
the Yale Psychological Laboratory, 31. 

Seasons, The ; An Anthology, 54 ; Sentimental 
Journey. A. G. Sterne, 55. 

Second Year Chemistry. Edward Hart, 45. 

Seeberg. R. Fundamental Truths of the 
Christian Religion, 12. 

Seger. Collected Writings, 49. 

Seven-Figure Logarithms. L. Schroen, 49. 

Severus, Patriarch of Antioch. Letters of, 26. 

Sharpe, Henry. Britain b.c, 54. 

Sharpe, Samuel. Bible, translated by, 15 ; 
Critical Notes on New Testament, 26. 



Shearman, A. T. Symbolic Logic, 31. 
Shihab Al Din. Futuh Al-Habashah. Ed. 

by S. Strong, 36. 
Short History ot the Hebrew Text. T. H. 

Weir, 27. 
Sichel, Walter. Laurence Sterne, 54. 
Silva Gadelica. Standish H. O'Grady, 41. 
Snellen's Ophthalmic Test Types, 49. 
Snyder, Harry. Soils and Fertilisers, 49. 
Social Gospel, Essays on the, 11. 
Social Idealism. Stocker, 33. 
Social Statics. Herbert Spencer, 32. 
Sociology, Principles of. Herbert Spencer, 31. 
Sociology, Study of. Herbert Spencer, 32, 
Soden, H. von, D.D. Books of the New 

Testament, 10. 
Soils and Fertilisers. Snyder, 49. 
Soils. Vide Wiley's Agricultural Analysis, 50. 
Soliloquies of St. Augustine, 31. 
Sonntag, C. O. A Pocket "'Flora of Edin- 
burgh, 49. 
Sorensen, S. Index to the Mahabharata, 36. 
Soul of Progress. Bishop Mercer, 22. 
Spanish Dictionary, Larger. Velasquez, 41. 
Spencer, Herbert. A System of Synthetic 

Philosophy, 31 ; Descriptive Sociology, Nos. 

1-8, 31 ; Theory of Religion and Morality, 

32 ; Works by, 31-32. 
Spinal Cord, Topographical Atlas of. Alex. 

Bruce, M.A., etc., 43. 
Spinoza. Edited by Prof. Knight, 33. 
Spiritual Teaching of Christ's Life, Henslow, 19. 
Statuette, The, and the Background. H. B. 

Brewster, 29. 
Statutes, The, of the Apostles. G. Horner, 

26, 37- 
Stephen, Canon. Democracy and Character, 26. 
Stephens, Geo. Bugge's Studies on Northern 

Mythology Examined, 55 ; Old Northern 

Runic Monuments, 55 ; The Runes, 55. 
Stephens, Thos., B.A., Editor. The Child 

and Religion, 10. 
Stereochemistry, Elements of. Hantzsch, 44. 
Sterne. A Study. Walter Sichel, 54 ; Senti- 
mental Journey, 55. 
Stewart, Rev. C. R. S. Anglican Liberalism, 12. 
Stillman, T. B. Engineering Chemistry, 49. 
Stocker, R. D. Social Idealism, 33. 
Storms. Piddington, 48. 

Strong, S. Arthur, ed. by. Shihab Al Din, 36. 
Study of the Saviour. Alex. Robinson, 25. 
Studies on Northern Mythology. Geo. 

Stephens, 55. 
Studies from the Yale Psychological Laboratory. 

Edward W. Scripture, Ph.D., 31. 
Subject- Index to London Library Catalogue, 

o 53; 

Sullivan, W. K. Celtic Studies, 41. 
Super-Organic Evolution. Lluria, 47. 
Surgical Anatomy of the Horse. J. T. Share 

Jones, 45. 
Symbolic Logic. A. T. Shearman, 31. 
Synthetic Philosophy, Epitome of. F. H. 

Collins, 33. 
Syriac Grammar. Theodor Noldeke, 36. 
System of Synthetic Philosophy. Herbert 

Spencer, 31, 



64 



INDEX— Continued. 



Tayler, Rev. John James. Character of the 

Fourth Gospel, 26. 
Taylor, Rev. C. Dirge of Coheleth, The, 26. 
Taylor, Rev. Dr. J. Massoretic Text, 26. 
Ten Services and Psalms and Canticles, 27. 
Ten Services of Public Prayer, 27. 
Tennant, Rev. F. R. Child and Religion, 10. 
Tent and Testament. Herbert Rix, 24. 
Testament, Old. Canonical Books of, 3 ; Re- 
ligions of, II ; Cuneiform Inscriptions, 25 ; 

Hebrew Text, Weir, 27 ; Literature, 21. 
Testament, The New, Critical Notes on. C. 

Tischendorf, 27. 
Testament Times, New. Acts of the Apostles, 

12; Apologetic of, 11; Books of the, 10; 

Commentary, Protestant, 8 ; History of, 7 ; 

Luke the Physician, 1 1 ; Textual Criticism, 6. 
Test Types. Pray, 48 ; Snellen, 49. 
Text and Translation Society, Works by, 37. 
Theories of Anarchy and of Law. H. B. 

Brewster, 28. 
Thermometer, History of the. Bolton, 43. 
Thomas, Rev. J. M. L. A Free Catholic 

Church, 27. 
Thornton, Rev. J. J. Child and Religion, 10. 
Tischendorf, C. The New Testament, 26. 
Tourist Guides. Grieben's, 52. 
Tower, O. F. Conductivity of Liquids, 49. 
Transactions of the Royal Dublin Society, 56. 
Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, 56. 
Transactions of the Royal Societyof Edinburgh, 

56. 
Trenckner, V. Pali Miscellany, 36. 
Truth of Religion, The. Eucken, 2. 
Turpie, Dr. D. M'C. Manual of the Chaldee 

Language, 37. 

Universal Christ. Rev. Dr. C. Beard, 14. 
Universalism Asserted. Rev. Thos. Allin, 14. 
Upton, Rev.C. B. Bases of Religious Belief, 14. 
Urine Analysis, A Text-Book of. Long, 47. 

Vaillante, Vincent, 38. 

Various Fragments. Herbert Spencer, 31. 

Vega. Logarithmic Tables, 50. 

Veiled Figure, The, 55. 

Velasquez. Larger Spanish Dictionary, 41. 

Venable, T. C. Development of the Periodic 

Law, 50 ; Study of Atom, 50. 
Via, Veritas, Vita. Dr. Drummond, 13. 
Viga Glums Saga. Sir E. Head, 41. 
Vincent, Jacques. Vaillante, 38. 
Virgin Birth of Christ. Paul Lobstein, 9. 
Vulgate, The. Henslow, 19. 



Vynne and Blackburn. Women unde 

Factory Acts, 55. 
Walford. Recollections, 55. 
Wallis, H. W. Cosmology of the Rigved 
Was Israel ever in Egypt? G. H. B. W 

28. 
Weir, T. H. Short History of the H. 

Text, 27. 
Weisse, T. H. Elements of German, 41 ; SI: 

Guide to German Idioms, 42 ; System.. 

Conversational Exercises in German, 41. 
Weizsacker, Carl von. The Apostolic Age, 
Weld, A. G. Glimpses of Tennyson, 55. 
Werner, E. T. C. Chinese, 33. 
Werner's Elementary Lessons in Cape Dut 

42. 
Wernle, Paul. Beginnings of Christianity. 
What is Christianity ? Adolf Harnack, 5, 9 
Wicksteed, Rev. P. H. " " ' 

tions of Holland, 27. 
Wiley, Harvey W. 

Analysis, 50. 
Wilkinson, Rev. J. R. 



Ecclesiastical Instii 

Agricultural Chemii 

Anglican Liberalisi. 



Williams, Right. Rev. W. L., D.C.L. Diet- 

ary of the New Zealand Language, 42; 1 

sons in Maori, 42. 
Wimmer, R. My Struggle for Light, 9. 
Women under the Factory Acts. Vynne • 

Blackburn, 55. 
Women's Suffrage. Helen Blackburn, 51. 
Woods, C. E. The Gospel of Rightness, . 
Woods, Dr. H. G. Anglican Liberalism, j 
Wright, Rev. C. H. H. Book of Genes? 

Hebrew Text, 28 ; Book of Ruth in Hebrc 

Text, 28 ; Daniel and its Critics, 28 ; Dan; 

and his Prophecies, 28 ; Light from Egjrpti 

Papyri, 28. 
Wright, G. H. Bateson. Book of Job, . 

Was Israel ever in Egypt? 28. 
Wright, W., and Dr. Hirsch, edited by. O 

mentary on the Book of Job, 28. 
Wundt, Wilhelm. Outlines of Psychology, 
Wysor. Metallurgy, 50. 

Yale Psychological Laboratory, Studies (i 
Yellow Book of Lecan, 42. 

Zeller, Dr. E. Acts of the Apostles, 8. 
Zoega, G. T. English-Icelandic Dictionary, - 
Zompolides, Dr. D. A Course of Mod*- 
Greek, 42. 



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